


Broken Horse

by bellatemple



Category: Haven (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Assisted Suicide, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Gore, Pre-Season/Series 01, References to Addiction, Season/Series 01, references to suicidal thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-05
Updated: 2019-10-09
Packaged: 2020-10-10 18:07:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 39,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20532317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellatemple/pseuds/bellatemple
Summary: Three years before Audrey arrived in Haven, Nathan's trouble was activated in a fight.So was Duke's.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> "The stitches in your winter clothes  
Your cello bows  
We stole your hair to make them  
We're sorry for the iron shoes  
We nailed to you  
And stuck you in the rain  
And then you sprinted away  
Sprinted away to where I don't know  
God's moving in your bloodstream  
Where the cross beats aren't so slow"  
\-- "Broken Horse", Freelance Whales
> 
> This fic would not exist without the inimitable ChristinaK. She is the forever alpha reader. Lord help me if I start writing in a fandom she doesn't know. . . .

It'd been ten years since Garland last had to pick up his son after a fight with that Crocker kid, more than, even. But seeing Nathan sitting by the side of the Coast Guard boat, wrapped in a shock blanket, a wad of bloody tissue jammed up his nose, it was like he was looking at a teenager again instead of a grown man, an officer of the law in good standing. In his thirties. 

Duke, of course, looked like a reprobate and a hooligan, albeit a more subdued one than usual. Garland was sure he'd look like that when he was sixty. If he was lucky enough to live that long. 

Garland watched Duke shiver in the wind while Nathan sat still as a stone, and felt his stomach drop into his knees. He'd need to test it to be sure and he hoped to god he was wrong, but he recognized that particular tilt to his boy's mouth. He watched water drip from Nathan's hair down his forehead, and Nathan not blink or move a muscle until it drifted into his field of vision. Then smudge it away into his skin, heedless of the bruising on his face that Garland was pretty sure meant a broken nose. 

Twenty-four years. Not quite a quarter century. Garland hoped it was shock. Didn't think it was shock. He was looking right at it, and Garland always saw what was right in front of his face. 

The troubles were back. Nathan's in particular, and who knew how many others had been activated, were being activated, would be activated before the night was over. He shot another look at Duke, silent and huddled in his own blanket, not meeting anyone's eyes. 

That was a bad goddamn sign. Unless the boy had done more growing up in his time away from Haven than Garland was willing to credit him with, he should've been talking his fool head off, trying alternately to charm or annoy his way out of the situation. Again, Garland couldn't swear it wasn't shock; the boy was as wet as Nathan and the water was damn cold this time of year. 

Garland had his own addictions, several of them in fact. He knew from withdrawal, knew from need. He couldn't see any of those on Duke's face yet, thank Christ. But he'd met Simon Crocker a time or two, and knew Vince Teagues well enough to have heard some stories. The Crocker trouble hit the brain like a mack truck. 

And Duke looked like he'd been run over. 

"Now what in the goddamn hell did you two get up to this time?" Garland asked, because some things a body didn't do well to dwell on. And while he might see things just fine, he still needed to _prove_ them, at least to himself, before he could act on anything. 

Nathan flinched, and Duke sank deeper into his blanket cocoon. 

"Fished 'em both out of the water out near the Knot," the Coasty said, sounding bored and irritated. Probably thought they were drunk. Hell, Duke likely even was. "Were doing a routine patrol, saw that one throw this one off a 120, then dive in after him. Damn stupidest thing I ever saw." 

Garland nodded, fishing in his pocket for his smokes. He could feel the shakes coming, a kind he hadn't felt in near a quarter century. Figured Nathan's trouble would be what kicked off Garland's own, just from sheer stupid dread. "That true, Nathan? Crocker threw you?" 

Nathan scowled. "I'm fine." 

"Not if you got pitched off a 120 you aren't," Garland grumbled. "Don't you pull any of that stoic crap with me now, son, where do you hurt?" 

Nathan's whole face shut down, not that it'd ever been that open to begin with. "I don't." He bit the words out, starting to shake now. With rage, Garland thought. It sure wasn't the cold. 

"I'm okay too," Duke said, a pale shadow of his usual bravado. His voice shook in time with his shivers. "In case you're wondering." 

"You're both idiots." Garland lit his cigarette and took a long drag. "Well. Come on then." Nathan climbed unsteadily to his feet, the blanket falling off his shoulders, not that he noticed. Duke followed a half-second behind, eyeing Garland — or, he suspected, the cuffs on Garland's belt — warily. 

"You're not arresting me, are you?" 

Garland looked him over. "There a reason I should?" 

Duke looked away. 

"Assaulting an officer," Nathan said, voice darker than the night sky. "Luring me out to sea under false pretences. Intention to —" 

"Like you two haven't beat the snot out of each other before," Garland said, cutting Nathan off. The boy could go on for days about all the wrong Duke did if anyone let him. Nathan gave him a hurt look, and Garland immediately felt sorry, though he wouldn't take it back. Nathan had been a raw nerve since he was eight, no matter how Garland tried to toughen him up. Still, something tonight had hit him much harder than usual, and Garland was pretty sure it wasn't Duke's fists. "Don't give me that, Nathan. He hasn't run off yet, has he? I'll take both your statements and if there's something worth pressing charges over, that's what I'll do." 

"Fine." It came out thick and wet, and Nathan pawed at his face again, for all the good that'd do him now, dislodging the tissues and getting fresh blood all over his knuckles. He flung his arm out in disgust, nearly clocking Duke who was hovering just behind, then stormed off towards Garland's squad car at the end of the docks. He didn't look back, so he never saw what Garland saw: the smear of blood he'd left on Duke's cheek. 

That smear fading into Duke's skin. 

Duke's sharp, shaky intake of breath as his eyes turned pale silver. 

"Yeah." Garland held Duke's gaze with a hard one of his own. He sucked harder on his cigarette, already itching to light another one. He'd been planning to quit, but that definitely wasn't happening now. He rested his hand on the butt of his gun. "So. You and I need to talk." 

Lucy — or whatever the hell her name would be this time — couldn't get into town soon enough.


	2. The Darkman

The Chief called them in as Nathan was heading out to post the notice on Thornton's door. Audrey hadn't even finished the paperwork yet — on that or any number of other trouble cases, and she wasn't in any kind of rush. Figuring out how to explain the troubles without _explaining the troubles_ was a pain in the ass. Word of the case had clearly made its way to the Chief's desk somehow, though, and judging by how many nicotine gum wrappers decorated said desk, he wasn't happy about it. 

"That's it?" he asked the moment Audrey closed the door. "That's your solution? Just lock the man up in the dark all the time so his damn shadow doesn't kill people?" 

Nathan, already defensive any time he and his father shared space, prickled. "He's blind," he said. "The dark doesn't bother him." 

"Lack of sunlight damn well might." Garland popped another piece of gum from its bubble wrapper with a crackle and crammed it into his mouth. "It's no way to live, Nathan. How long do you expect him to have to hide out like that?" 

"Until the troubles are over. Until it's safe." 

"'Safe,' he says." Garland turned to Audrey. "And you, Parker? You think this is the best plan?" 

"Short of killing him?" Audrey shrugged. "I'm not sure what else we can do. He's not the only one who's had to isolate himself due to his trouble." Beatty, the harbor master, spent her weekends chained in a lighthouse with her five children. Ray had taken to sea rather than give up his music or his wife's mental health. Bill McShaw couldn't share food with anyone — to the point of having to grow his own ingredients — without risking giving them food poisoning if his mood tanked. Troubles were bizarre and isolating. She wasn't sure why this one in particular had set Garland off. 

Garland dropped his head between his arms, squeezing the back of his neck and chewing furiously. "Does he have any family? I know the wife is gone, but did they have kids?" 

Nathan shook his head. "No. No kids." 

"Siblings?" Garland asked. "Cousins? Either of his folks still alive?" 

Nathan scowled. "I don't know. What does it matter?" 

"Troubles can be hereditary," Audrey said slowly. "Like Ray's and Beatty's. You're worried there might be another darkman out there." 

Garland looked at her, one of those strange, distant expressions he got sometimes when she solved a trouble no one else had managed to touch. Then he jerked a thumb in her direction and stared at Nathan. "Parker gets it. This isn't the kind of trouble we want running loose all over again. Aarons has family, we're going to have to do something about it." 

Nathan rocked back faintly, mood darkening even further at the edges. "And what do _you_ suggest?"

Garland chewed even harder, eyes flicking from Nathan to Audrey and back before he seemed to come to a decision. He sat up, slapping his palm down on his desk. "Tomorrow morning," he said. "We're gonna go see an old friend."

*

Audrey had been expecting — and dreading — a road trip. Garland had warned her it'd take a while to get to this "old friend", and she'd been bracing for a long, awkward hour crammed into Nathan's truck, listening to the two of them snipe at each other and wondering when Garland was going to stop holding her up as the golden example Nathan was supposed to be following.

She was almost right. It was long and awkward and there was sniping, and Garland pointed out several times where Audrey was better at dealing with the troubles than Nathan was. But instead of being stuck in Nathan's truck, or even Garland's more comfortable sedan, they spent the time on a small boat loaded down with crates. 

"Elijah Craig," Nathan said, peering into one of the crates. They'd managed some silence for awhile there, and Audrey had been hoping for a truce as they steered closer to the dark lump on the horizon she assumed was their destination. She should have known better. "Macallan. Diplomatico. Got to be a thousand dollars' worth of liquor in here." He pulled out one of the bottles, dark amber with a black label. "The hell, Chief?" 

"Man's got expensive tastes," Garland said. "Pack that back up, would you, we're almost there." 

Nathan visibly bit back a retort, returning the bottle to the crate with care and closing it back up. He moved up next to Garland in the wheelhouse and peered through the spray. The island grew rapidly, details resolving as they approached. Audrey could make out a rocky cliff and a hell of a lot of trees, but not much else. Garland turned the boat to follow the coastline, and as they rounded the cliff edge a small dock appeared, not quite long enough for the single, rusting fishing boat pulled up beside it. She scanned the shoreline, but saw no other signs of human habitation. 

Nathan grabbed onto the gunwale and sat abruptly, his face pale. "The _Cape Rouge_," he whispered, like he was looking at something out of legend. "I thought — you said he skipped town." 

"Did not." Garland shrugged, not looking back at him. "You assumed it." 

Nathan shoved back to his feet, grabbing Garland's arm. "How long? How long has he been hiding here? How long have you _known?_" 

Garland steered closer to the dock, throttling back on the motor. "Now do you actually want answers here, Nathan, or do you just want to keep yelling at me?" 

Nathan flushed, face turning a color Audrey had only seen on him under the influence of Ray's trouble, when he'd gone to attack the Rev. She tugged on his shirt, only belatedly realizing the futility of the gesture. 

"Hey!" she said instead, snapping her fingers until he looked at her. "You want to tell me who this guy is?" 

"Duke," Nathan said, biting the word out like a curse. Audrey shook her head at him, the name — title? — meaning nothing to her. "The man who activated my trouble." 

Garland hummed, meeting Audrey's eye with a shrug. He jerked his thumb towards the dock, and she looked up to see a man step out from between two rocks to stand at the top of the dock. She shot a glance at Nathan and watched him seethe for a moment before turning back to study the man as Garland brought the boat in. 

He was tall, she saw, at least Nathan's height, with a slightly broader build. His dark hair was long and bleached in streaks by the sun, left loose to blow in the wind; his facial hair, more pirate than hermit, was neatly trimmed. He wore sheepskin and flannel like nearly every other man Audrey had met since coming to Maine, though the shirt was unbuttoned most of the way down his breastbone, revealing a collection of necklaces and pendants most men would probably rather choke on than wear. 

He held a pistol-gripped shotgun with casual ease, aimed straight at the boat. 

Garland shut the engine off, looking unconcerned. Nathan stared dead-eyed at the man, his whole body quivering. 

"Duke," he greeted, half-insult, half-plea. 

"Nathan," Duke said, voice thin and dry as paper. "Chief. You're not my grocery delivery." 

"Got your supplies right here, Duke," Garland said, patting the crates. "Don't get your panties in a twist." 

Duke lifted the shotgun to his shoulder, leaning down to pick up and toss Garland a rope. "Supply runs don't usually come with . . . company." He met Audrey's gaze and gave her a lazy smile. He wasn't as traditionally handsome as Nathan, but he wasn't at all bad looking, and he knew it. She smirked back. 

"You implying I'm part of the 'supplies'?" she asked. 

Duke pressed his free hand to his chest and gave her a look of exaggerated shock. "I would never imply such things about a lady." His eyes drifted to Nathan, who was still an unhealthy shade of puce. "_Him_, on the other hand. . . ."

Audrey glanced at Nathan again, amused. Was Duke saying Nathan would imply those things? Or that he was implying them about Nathan? 

"This is Audrey Parker," Nathan said. Audrey wasn't sure he'd taken his eyes off Duke yet. "My partner." 

Duke rocked his head back and gave Audrey a once-over, noting the gun and badge on her belt, the smile sliding off his face. "Disappointing." He turned abruptly and disappeared back behind the rocks. Audrey leaned in a little and saw a set of steps carved into the cliff face, leading up into the trees. "Leave the crates on the dock for now," he called back. "I'll take care of them later." 

Garland stepped off the boat, turning to offer Audrey a hand. She took it reluctantly — she resented him thinking she needed the help, but the boat was still swaying faintly, and she wasn't much of a sailor. She made it halfway down the doc towards the stairs before realizing Nathan hadn't followed. 

"You coming, son?" Garland asked. "Or are you planning to stand out here and catch flies all morning?" 

Nathan choked a reply. He grabbed the crate of liquor and handed it off to the Chief, then turned to grab the next crate. Audrey decided to leave the unloading to them and started up the stairs after Duke. 

She had to rush to catch up, stretching her legs and taking the steps two at a time wherever she could. The stairs were narrow and steep, and Duke wasn't exactly taking them slow. He apparently had to haul crates up and down them on a regular basis, she she supposed she couldn't be surprised. "You live all the way out here full time?" she asked. 

"Yep." 

"By yourself." 

"Mmhm." 

Great. He'd been charming enough on the dock, but he was nearly as monosyllabic as Nathan now. All because he'd noticed she was a cop. "You greet all your visitors with firearms?" 

"Keeps out the tourists." 

They crested the top of the stairs and walked out of the trees into a clearing maybe half the size of a football field. A stone cabin sat in the center, short and squat, with a covered porch lining the front and a sharply pitched roof. There was a pile of firewood against the side of the porch under a metal awning, though she could smell what was probably a diesel generator around the back. The cabin looked well-kept and tidy, its small windows covered in clean yellow curtains, a comfortable-if-miscellaneous collection of furniture along the porch. 

"Welcome to Casa del Crocker," Duke said, looking back at her over his shoulder. He seemed faintly pleased by her assessment. "Grab a seat. I'll see if the coffee's ready." He disappeared through the front door of the cabin abruptly, shutting it firmly behind him. Audrey blinked at the odd mix of cheerful host and awkward recluse and sat down on one of the chairs and looked out over the lawn. 

The view was astonishing. 

The clearing sat on top of a sharp incline, and the ocean lay stretched out in front of her from horizon to horizon. The water sparkled gently in the sunlight, a roiling, textured silver meeting clear blue sky. She could just see the end of the big boat at the dock down to her left, and she realized the porch must face west, towards Haven. Duke would have seen them coming from miles off. 

She heard Garland and Nathan well before she saw them, bickering in low voices as they came up the stairs. Continuing the same theme from the boat, she guessed: Garland's reticence, and Nathan's inability to ask the right questions. The door to the cabin opened as they climbed into sight. Duke put a tray with a french press, a collection of mismatched mugs, and a hilariously dainty cream-and-sugar set on an old crate next to the chairs, glanced over at them, then started pouring the coffee with what Audrey assumed to be a studied air of nonchalance. 

"Milk, one sugar, right?" he asked. 

Audrey made a face. "No. Why would you know how I take my coffee?" 

"I wouldn't," Duke said easily, that charm from the docks back in full force. "But wouldn't it be cool if I did?" 

Audrey couldn't think of an answer, so she just accepted the offered cup with a raised eyebrow and a smirk. He waited an extra moment, then shrugged and turned to watch the Wuornoses again. 

"Took you two long enough." 

Garland wheezed faintly as he climbed onto the porch and sank into a creaking wicker chair. Nathan stopped at the porch steps and continued to stare at Duke. Duke poured himself a cup of coffee and nodded to the tray. 

Nathan glowered at the french press. "Barely enough left for another cup." 

"You're the first guests I've had in years, Nate," Duke said. "Deal with it." 

Garland huffed, pulling out his cigarettes. "You got some gall pointing that shotgun at us back there, Crocker." 

"Relax, old man. It's loaded with salt. No one's been smuggling me shot." 

Nathan snorted, then looked faintly embarrassed when they all looked at him. "What're you doing out here, Duke? Thought you'd be in Tijuana these days. Or Bangkok." 

"Bangkok sucks this time of year." Duke shot Garland a look over the lip of his mug. "You didn't tell him." 

Garland shrugged. "He never asked." 

Duke rolled his eyes. 

"Am now," Nathan said, tearing his gaze from Duke to stare down his father. "What's he doing here, Chief?" 

Garland took the time to pack and light his cigarette before answering. Audrey wrinkled her nose, but Garland had at least managed to sit downwind of her, and had the grace to blow the smoke up and out, away from the group. He took a long, focussed drag, then finally spoke. "Same thing Thornton Aarons is doing, sitting in his house in the dark." 

Nathan's brows pulled together, and he gave Duke a searching look, which was at least a step up from his previous glare. Duke stared down into his coffee. Neither of them spoke. 

"You're troubled," Audrey said, tilting her head down to try to meet Duke's eye. She wondered if this was some sort of object lesson of Garland's. Long term effects of isolation on a troubled person, maybe. 

Nathan shook his head like he was trying to dislodge something. "He is not." 

Duke sighed and looked up. "How the hell would you know, Nate?" 

"Don't call me Nate." 

Duke rolled his whole head along with his eyes, mouth opening to retort. Garland got there first. "He is, Nathan. Activated the same night yours did. Hell, near about the same goddamn time. How else you figure he could throw you off that boat of his?" 

Nathan finally looked away, out towards the sea and the big boat down by the docks. "What is it?" he asked, eyes shifting inexorably back towards Duke. Audrey wondered just what kind of history the two of them had to make Nathan stare that way. "He's got extra strength or something, so he's gotta live here?" 

Duke pushed his hair out of his eyes, looking up at Nathan through his eyelashes. "You remember my dad, Nathan?" 

"No." 

Duke huffed. "Lucky you." He lifted his chin, shoulders dropping. "He was a dick. Like, professionally. Turns out it was all 'cause of the family curse." 

"Your daddy wasn't a bad man, Duke," Garland said, taking another long drag on his cigarette. "I seen much worse in my time, men who didn't have the same excuses Simon had." 

"Great." Duke sipped his coffee. "That's real reassuring." 

"So you have to live out here alone," Audrey said slowly, making a show of thinking out loud. "Because you're a dick?" 

That startled a laugh out of Nathan. Duke smirked and held up a finger. "Because I don't want to _be_ a dick." 

"Crockers are special," Garland said, tone grave. He glared around like they were a bunch of punk kids. "Their trouble isn't tied to emotions like most of 'em. It's set off by blood." He looked at Nathan. "Troubled blood." 

Nathan sobered up fast, graze dropping to the floor. He lifted one hand towards his nose before dropping it again. "What does it do?" 

"Gives me super strength," Duke said, full of gallows humor. "And makes me want to kill people." 

Nathan's head shot up from its contemplative droop and his hand landed on his gun. 

"None of that now, son, Duke's not going to hurt you." Garland gave Duke a narrow look. "He can't." 

"No weapons," Duke agreed, still with that dark-edged cheer. "No knives. No bullets. Can't even chop my own firewood." His smile was sharp enough to draw blood. "Had a moose on the island last year. Kept cornering me in the house until it finally swam away." 

"Moose can swim?" Audrey asked, startled. "In the _ocean?_" 

Duke brightened, nodding. "They're actually really good at it. They graze underwater. Sometimes even get eaten by orcas." 

Audrey smiled at the little boy enthusiasm in his voice. She wondered how it was a man like him, gregarious and energetic, could go three years on an island without company. 

She thought of Beatty in her lighthouse, Ray on his boat. Thornton, alone in the dark. She shivered. 

"Why'd you bring us out here, Chief?" Nathan asked. "What's Duke got to do with Thornton?" 

Garland stubbed out his cigarette in one of the empty mugs and looked askance at Duke. All the innocence and cheer drained back out of Duke's face. 

"What?" Duke asked, voice flat and spare again as it had been on the dock. Audrey remembered he was a man who held a gun like he knew how to use it. "Fuck. Chief. He's not another cannibal, is he?" 

_Another?_

"His shadow kills people," Garland said. 

Duke rubbed his hand over his mouth. "Relatives?" 

"Don't know for sure yet. Some cousins on his mom's side, might be troubled." 

"Hey," Nathan barked. "I'm _asking_." 

Duke looked at Garland. Garland nodded, waving his hand from Duke to Nathan. Duke sighed. 

"My trouble wants me to kill people. Because when I do, I kill their trouble too." 

Nathan's face darkened again. Audrey leaned forward, setting her coffee mug aside. "How do you know?" 

Duke nodded to Garland. 

"It's what Crockers do," Garland said. "Have done for generations." 

"How many?" Nathan asked, voice trembling. The muscles in his jaw jumped between words. He crowded forward, finally stepping onto the porch proper in order to loom over Duke. "How many people have you killed?"

Duke held his ground, still leaning against the railing. "One," he said. "Just one." 

"It was for the best," Garland said. "Trust me on that one." 

"Trust you?" Nathan whirled on him. "How the hell am I ever going to _trust you_ again?" 

"_Nathan_," Audrey said, pitching her voice to pierce through his rage. She'd seen this kind of anger from him before on a larger scale. She'd seen the shame he'd felt afterwards. He looked at her and swallowed, backing off a step. Audrey nodded. 

"Who?" Nathan asked, voice quieter if not calmer. 

"Angie Benton," Garland said. He reached for his cigarettes again, fingers shaking. Audrey was beginning to see why he smoked so much. 

"Angie Benton was eaten by a bear." 

Duke choked on his coffee. "Seriously?" He raised his eyebrows at Garland. "That's what you came up with?" 

"Beats another gas leak." Garland found his cigarettes and tapped the pack sharply against the palm of his hand. He slid one out and tucked it between his lips. It wobbled wildly as he spoke. "She had a cannibalism trouble. Knew it from last time. This time, she also had three nieces. Kids." 

"Who might have the same trouble," Audrey said softly. Nathan huffed through his nose. Duke stared out to sea. "And if Thornton's trouble comes from his mother's side. . . ."

"I know Thornton already asked you to kill him, Nathan," Garland said. "It'd be a kindness." 

"_No._" Nathan lifted his head, glaring at his father again. "We're not killing anyone." He turned on Duke. "_You're_ not killing anyone." 

"Hey. Buddy." Duke held up both hands. "I'm on your side. Why do you think I'm living all the way out here?" 

"Then get out," Nathan said. "Dammit, Duke, get on the _Rouge_ and take your damn killer trouble a thousand miles away from here!" 

Duke smiled sadly. "Can't. _Rouge_ is cracked. I take her to sea, she'll sink." 

_Cracked_. Like the roads around Haven. Audrey wondered what kind of force it took to crack an industrial fishing boat. It didn't seem to her like the sort of thing that just happened. 

On the other hand, it had looked pretty rusty. 

Nathan rounded on his father again. "You set this up, didn't you. You keep him out here, stocked with top shelf booze, as what? Your pet assassin?" 

Garland stared back at him, looking old and tired. "You really think that little of me, son?" He shook his head, moving to light his cigarette, his hands trembling too hard to aim the lighter. "I don't want that boy killing any more than you do, but sometimes the Crocker curse is the only thing we've got. So yeah, I asked Duke to stay out here. Him staying in Haven is just asking his trouble to turn on him, but that doesn't mean he can't help, dammit!" 

A crash sounded from the woods, and they all spun to look. A cloud of dust rose above the treetops, along with a large flock of birds. Garland shook his hands out, breathing hard, then finally managed to get his cigarette lit, dragging on it like it was the only thing that kept him glued together. Audrey frowned, something niggling at the back of her brain. 

"You said that moose swam away, right?" Nathan asked.

Duke shrugged. "Coulda swum back." 

"So what do you think, son?" Garland asked, eyes on Duke rather than Nathan. "You going to help us out?" 

Duke groaned, dropping his head. He stood after a moment, aiming for the cabin door. "I need a drink." 

Nathan checked his watch. "It's not even noon yet." 

"Perks of being a hermit." He shut the door soundly behind him, rattling the timbers of the porch roof. Nathan watched him go, a moment of longing crossing his face, then turned to look out to sea. Garland dragged on his cigarette, held it, and let it out on a long sigh. 

"I swear," Audrey said into the silence. "The more I learn about this damn place, the less I know."

*

Duke was loose-limbed by the time they reached Thornton's, but not, Audrey thought, the least bit drunk. He had been when they left the island, and had sat on the back of Garland's boat with his eyes closed, a bottle clenched in his fist. When Audrey had tried to check on him, he'd shrugged and muttered something about meditation, so she'd returned to Nathan, sitting as far from Duke as possible on the front of the small boat.

Outside Thornton's house, still in the car, Garland passed Duke a large hunting knife. Duke took it carefully, sliding it out of its sheath just enough to check the blade. 

"Sharp," he said. His voice had emptied, gone soft and hoarse. He slid the knife back in and tucked it into his pocket. "Good." 

Nathan hadn't said a word since the island. He stared out the windshield towards the house. "I'm going with you." 

Duke paused, his hand on the door release. "No."

Nathan twisted to look at him. Audrey couldn't guess what he was thinking. "You're not doing this alone." 

"Yeah. I am." 

Nathan opened his door to get out. Garland grabbed his arm and didn't let go. 

"Not you, Nathan," he said. "No one with a trouble." He met Audrey's eyes in the rearview. "Audrey." 

Audrey nodded and swallowed, double checking her own weapon before climbing out of the car. 

Duke waited for her on the front walk. He didn't argue, didn't say a word to her, just raised his hand and knocked. 

For a long time no one answered. Audrey wondered if maybe Thornton had already given in, done to himself what Nathan had refused to do. She wondered if that was better or worse than what Duke was here to do, given the situation. 

Wondered at a world where she had to wonder if one man being killed by another was better than that man killing himself. 

Duke knocked again. "Mr. Aarons," he called. "It's alright. I'm here with Officer Parker from HPD." He glanced at Audrey, took a breath. "I'm just here to talk." 

The door opened the barest crack. Duke waited, giving Thornton plenty of time to get clear of the light's reach before slipping in. Audrey followed close behind. 

They paused in the front hall, giving their eyes time to adjust to the darkness. Hardly any light bled through the covered windows, just enough to make out basic shapes without creating any shadows. Audrey hooked her finger under Duke's belt to keep track of him, suddenly glad Nathan hadn't come instead. It was strange and claustrophobic enough, moving around a stranger's home in the dark, and she at least could feel the walls and the floor, and the heat from Duke beside her. They moved into what Audrey guessed was a living room, fumbling a bit before finding seats on the couch, close enough to touch. Thornton was nothing but a dark shape across from them, still and silent. Duke clapped his hands on his thighs once, let out an awkward laugh, and began. 

He hadn't lied; all he did was talk. He introduced himself and asked Thornton earnestly how he was holding up. If he was worried about getting bored or lonely, staying in the house. Thornton answered in short bursts at first, then audibly relaxed, warming to Duke's friendly concern. Audrey kept quiet and listened, responding occasionally when prompted, but otherwise content to just sit while the two troubled men helped each other. 

And they were, she realized with a start. She could feel through her arm against his as Duke relaxed, sinking down into the cushions, his hands moving as he told Thornton about his own situation, living alone out on the island. Audrey tensed when she first felt him lift his arm, images of him lunging forward and plunging that hunting knife into Thornton mid affable anecdote leaving her cold and wobbly with adrenaline, but she quickly realized that Duke was just the sort who liked to talk with his hands. Even in the dark, even to a blind man. She pressed her hand to her face, turning a laugh into a cough. 

And listened. 

Duke told Thornton about winter mornings so silent he woke up wondering if he'd gone deaf. About summer nights spent naked out on the lawn, because it was hot and no one else was there to care. He told Thornton about the days the solitude weighed so heavy he couldn't get out of bed and about the days when it filled him up so much he ran out into the woods and just screamed and screamed and screamed. He told him about dreaming sometimes of diving into the ocean at the end of his dock and swimming away until his arms didn't work anymore. He spoke of the thrill of fear when unfamiliar boats passed or approached the island, about the ever-present spectre of his trouble, the threat of losing control. 

And when Thornton asked what, exactly, that trouble was, Duke told him plainly, with no euphemisms to soften the blow. 

"Are you here to kill me?" Thornton asked, a thread of fear in his voice like a single line of color through a dense plaid. There was too much else in there for Audrey to name. 

"No," Duke said, leaning forward and resting his elbows on his knees. "I'm here to ask you if you want me to."

*

Audrey paused on the front stoop, hand up to shield her eyes as she blinked in the afternoon light. Behind her, Duke closed the door softly but firmly. Nathan and Garland waited between Garland's car and an unfamiliar truck, a tall, broad man with shaggy blonde hair by their side.

"Crocker," the man greeted with a nod. 

"Sasquatch," Duke replied. He walked over, flipping the sheathed knife in his hand, and offered it to Garland. 

"Dwight's here to clean up the mess," Nathan said, to Audrey rather than Duke, his face and voice made of stone. 

"There is none," Audrey told him. She shot Duke a look. He didn't look back, just got into the back of Garland's car and pulled out the bottle from the boat, taking a long drink. Garland had apparently been chain smoking while they were inside; the ground at his feet was littered with cigarette butts. Audrey wondered what the stats on addiction looked like in Haven compared to other similarly sized towns as she met Nathan's gaze again. "Thornton's alive." 

"Well." Garland dropped his latest cigarette and ground it out on the pavement with his toe. "Alright then." 

Audrey wondered if it could possibly really be that simple. "What about his cousins?" 

Dwight shrugged. "We don't know. They know what to watch out for, though. And if the darkman ever comes back. . . ." He trailed off, then quirked a smile at Audrey. "Good to meet you, Officer Parker. Nathan." He nodded to them both, shot a final glance towards Duke in the car, then climbed into the truck and left. 

"Best get going," Garland said, reaching into his pocket for his keys for once, instead of a cigarette. "It's a long way to the island and back, and I'd like to get it done before dark. You two get back to the station, would you? You got paperwork to catch up on." 

Nathan didn't look like he was going to answer, so Audrey nodded for him. She watched Garland drive off before turning to Nathan. "So I guess we're walking." 

Nathan stared at Thornton's door. "It's not far." 

"Hey." Audrey bumped him with her shoulder, making sure to angle her body so he could see the gesture. "You pretty much won here, you know. Thornton's alive. Duke didn't kill anyone." 

Nathan still didn't look at her. "Jess left. Said she couldn't deal with the troubles anymore. Said she's not strong enough." 

Audrey mentally cursed the woman, though she was sure Jess was cursing herself just as much. She couldn't deal? She was lucky to have that option. Too many others didn't. Not Beatty or Ray or Bill or Thornton or Duke. Not Marion and her weather trouble, not Langdon and his living taxidermy. Not Vickie and her voodoo drawings. 

And not Nathan. 

"I'm sorry," Audrey said. It felt worse than inadequate, but it was all she had. 

Nathan shrugged. "Can't really blame her." 

"Really?" Audrey asked. "Because I sure as hell can." She popped up on her toes then, following an impulse, and kissed him on the cheek. He'd get her intention if not the actual sensation, and hey. It was the thought that counted. "Now come on." She struck out down the street in what she really hoped was the direction of the police station. "Paperwork waits for no man." 

He stayed behind for several moments. When she turned to look, he was blinking into the middle distance, looking like someone had hit him over the head with a hammer.


	3. Interlude

Garland led the way onto the broken down little dock, navigating carefully around the wood that had rotted away. "We'll get this fixed up for you, of course, so's you can take deliveries. There are a couple cottages on the island, old hunting lodges and the like, some of them nicer'n the others. No large game left. Nothing that'll eat more than whatever gardening you might get up to. You sure you don't need a coat, son?" 

Duke stood on the dock, hands jammed in his pockets, shivering in his thin denim shirt. "I'm fine," he said. "I'm a sailor." 

Garland didn't think he looked fine at all, but he wasn't Duke's father, and the boy was more than old enough now to make the decision to get pneumonia himself. "If you say so." He cleared his throat and leaned over the water to spit. He was up to a pack and a half a day now; phlegm was just a fact of life. He gestured Duke towards the stairs at the end of the dock and started up them. "Place belongs to the Teagues, they said you could use it long as you need. We'd set you up with a radio, of course, a couple of generators, maybe one of those satellite phones if we can find one cheap. Carpenter's Knot's only a mile or so west of here, so there's already a supply boat that does the rounds twice a week, mail and groceries and the like. You get into trouble, need an evac, you can radio the coasties. They'll take care of you right quick." 

Duke sighed, looking just like he had when Garland used to bust him for drinking in high school. Like he'd already seen and disapproved of the whole damn world. "I know how that works, Chief. I'm a sailor." 

Garland nodded, huffing a little as they climbed. "It won't be easy now. You'll have to spend just about all your time alone. Man can go stir-crazy out here, he's not careful. But you just let us know what you need: books, booze, bet we can even rustle you up an old TV and some movies if you want. Whatever gets you through it." He stopped, his thighs screaming, and hunched over a little, trying to catch his breath. Damn kid stopped a few stairs below, not even looking flushed. 

"I'm a sailor," Duke said again. Garland started to wonder if it was less a "been there, done that" thing than fear of finding himself run aground. 

"You'd be doing Haven a favor, Duke," Garland said. Pleaded, really. He could see which way Duke's wind was blowing. "All your expenses, they'd be on us. You wouldn't have to worry about a damn thing. The sea'll still be waiting once the troubles are over." 

Duke turned, though they were too far into the woods now to see the water. "What happens if I say no?" 

Garland reached for his smokes, found the packet crushed and damp in his pocket, and cursed. Duke turned back, worry all over his face. 

"Chief?" 

"You'll go back to your life then, won't you," Garland said with a scoff. "I'm not arresting you, son, not this time. And I'm not stranding you out here against your will. You want to stay in town, hang out with the troubled, that's up to you. But when you slip? When that trouble of yours catches up to you, and it will, mark my words, sooner than you think. We'll be there." He straightened his shoulders, glad for the stairs that let him stare down at the boy. "And we will take you out." 

Duke stared back. "Like you did my father." 

Garland nodded. "Just so." 

Duke turned in place, hands out and grasping at nothing. He took in the endless trees in every direction, hiding the equally endless stretches of water and sky. Garland crossed his fingers in his pocket and prayed, not to God in Heaven but to Lucy in her barn, wherever it went between visits. Prayed that this foolish boy would see reason. That Garland wouldn't have to get more Crocker blood on his hands. 

"No," Duke said. Something inside Garland died. "No, this is. This is absurd. I'm a _sailor_, Chief." 

"You keep saying that like it means something, boy." 

"Because it _does_. I've faced — everything. Hurricanes in the Bermuda Triangle. Cargo cults in the South Pacific. Fucking Somali pirates. And I have _never_ had to kill anybody. I'm sure as hell not going to start now!" 

Garland watched him flail, watched him talk himself up like a big man, like he could out-stubborn hundreds of years of genetics and magic. Centuries of blood. 

He reminded Garland so much of Lucy in the days before the Hunter it took his breath away. 

"Alright," he said, and watched Duke's hands drop back to his sides. "If that's your choice, alright. Just know: we'll be watching you. I put too much into this town to let it be destroyed because of a damn stubborn kid." 

"Fine." Duke smiled, hard and angry, backing down the steps. "Go ahead. You'll be wasting your time though. I'm _not_ my father." 

Yeah, Garland thought, watching him go. That was just what Simon had said too.


	4. Carpenter's Knot

Audrey watched the old man steering the boat with interest. It mostly looked like driving a car: turn the wheel, turn the boat. There was a handle that was clearly a throttle, and no brakes she could see, but still. She was sure she could learn to do it herself without too much difficulty. The man reached up to finger some sort of charm, and Audrey smiled a little. There wasn't even much by way of traffic out here to worry about, no lane lines to stare at and follow. It'd be even easier than a car. 

"Stop it, Parker," Nathan said. He sat on the side of the boat, hands braced on either side of him. She wondered how much of the pitch and sway of the boat he could feel. His skin was numb, sure, but he had to have some sense of his body in space, right?

"Stop what?" 

"Staring." He gave her a knowing look. "You're freaking Gus out." 

Gus, Audrey thought. Gus, Gus, Gus. Old dude. White beard. Boat for hire. Gus. 

"I'm just watching," she said. "Gus doesn't mind, do you, Gus?" 

Gus grunted, staring out to sea. 

"Do you need a license for these things, Gus?" Audrey asked. "How much does it cost to run it?" 

"Parker," Nathan said again. Gus shot him one of those blankly stoic, Maine man looks. Nathan reached out and tugged on Audrey's sleeve. "Leave him be." 

"I'm just curious. Seems like everyone in Haven can drive a boat. I want to fit in." 

"Mmhm." Nathan steered her around and gently shoved until she was sitting across from him. Balancing out the boat, probably. That was something she was pretty sure you had to do with boats. "Has nothing to do with your new island friend." 

"Duke?" Audrey scoffed. Nathan just watched her, one corner of his lips quirking up. Damn him. "He just seemed so lonely. He could use a non-troubled visitor from time to time." 

Nathan's amusement faded straight into a scowl. "Don't let him get under your skin, Parker. Duke's only ever in it for himself." 

"Right." Audrey nodded, squinting as the wind blew salt spray into her face. "It's so selfish how he moved to a deserted island to avoid hurting people." 

Nathan hmphed. "Just saying. You don't know him like I do." 

Audrey nodded, unable to argue with that. On the other hand, Nathan had been down on most everyone since Jess had left. She supposed it was hard to get close to people when you couldn't feel them. Harder still when the few you did let in up and left. 

Was Duke like Jess for Nathan? Just another person who'd disappointed him? Just another ex? 

"So what's this big mystery then?" she asked. "Since I'm guessing we're not going to visit Duke." 

"We're not," Nathan confirmed. He squinted out past the boat's windscreen and pointed. "We're headed there: Carpenter's Knot." 

"Visiting some _other_ mysterious island recluse, then." 

Nathan nodded, lips quirking again. It was as close as he usually came to a smile, and Audrey was determined to make him do it as many times as possible. "Pretty much. There's an old resort there, closed up years ago. Vaughn Carpenter still lives there, reported seeing something . . . strange." 

"Strange," Audrey said. "Strange like what?"

Nathan shrugged. "Guess we'll find out." 

Audrey sighed. She really should've been used to this by now. Still, it was supposed to be her day off. "What do you think, Gus?" she asked. "Ghost ships? Maybe a sea monster?" 

Gus didn't turn from his spot at the wheel. 

"Yeah," Audrey said. "Good insight." 

Well. There were worse ways to spend her birthday than solving a trouble.

*

Audrey stepped back as her — her party guests, apparently — chuckled and chatted. She was overwhelmed, watching them, grateful and confused and more than a little annoyed at Nathan for his ruse, though she was pretty sure the "surprise" part of this party hadn't been his idea. She'd just admitted to him last week while working on the darkman case that "friends" weren't something she really did, and yet here she was, on her birthday, with a whole crowd of people ready to celebrate.

Were they her friends? Vince and Dave and Eleanor and Garland? Nathan, sure, she felt confident enough about calling him a friend by now. Julia, of course, she didn't know at all, though it was a relief to finally meet another woman her own age that she wasn't trying to talk down from a trouble. The others. . . . 

Yeah. Eleanor had offered to help her investigate Lucy, even though it wasn't her job as ME, and for all the grief she'd given her, Audrey found she liked the woman's style. Vince and Dave were ridiculous, but in a lovable sort of way, and they'd been a great help when she needed a dress for that restaurant opening. Garland — 

Well, no. Garland she felt just fine keeping in the "acquaintance" zone. He was her boss. They could be friend_ly_, like she was with Agent Howard, but "friends" maybe crossed a line. 

Still. That was three people. Three whole individuals she could call for a ride if she needed it. Three more people who not only knew when her birthday was, but cared enough to want to celebrate it. 

"Are you crying?" a voice asked, out of the darkness down the hall. Audrey jumped and turned, and wondered when people would stop sneaking up on her. "Because crying will not be tolerated today." 

"Ha." Audrey screwed up her nose. She was _not_ crying, thank you. "What are you doing here? Shouldn't one of the perks of being a hermit be _not_ attending random parties?" 

Duke moved closer, leaning against the wall out of view of the door to the party room. His hands were shoved deep into the pockets of his denim jacket. "You'd think so, wouldn't you." He flashed her a grin, his teeth bright white against his dark facial hair. "I guess I'm not a very good hermit." 

"Duke Crocker?" Julia said, leaning out into the hall. "No one told me you were back in Haven, too." 

Duke's smile went pained for a moment before settling into rueful. "You know me. I like to keep a low profile." 

Julia snorted. "Since when?" 

Nathan stepped out into the hall behind her, the quietly affable expression he'd worn since arriving fading into a scowl. "The hell do you think you're doing here?" 

Duke straightened from his lean, but kept his hands firmly in his pockets. "Nathan," he said pointedly. "Good morning. How've you been?" 

"How'd you even get here? You don't have a boat." 

Julia frowned. "What happened to his boat?" 

"Duke!" And there was Dave. "It's been ages!" 

"Duke's here?" Vince called. Audrey heard Garland curse. Duke backed up a step, back towards the shadows under the stairs. 

"I was _invited_," he said, defensive. "Vaughn's a friend. He gave me a lift." 

"Well hell, Duke," Eleanor said. Audrey wanted to kiss her for her good cheer. "The more the merrier!" 

"That's the spirit." An older man stepped out of the same entryway Duke had come in and looked over the crowd. "Am I the last one here?" he asked with a happy chuckle. He clapped Duke on the shoulder as he went past and greeted the party with open arms. "Well, I always enjoy making an entrance. I'm Vaughn Carpenter. Welcome to the Knot. Mi casa es su, uh hotel for the weekend." 

Eleanor cheered, and the general mood of the party lightened back up. Duke, Audrey noticed, quietly let himself fade into the background as everyone chatted away. She saw Garland sidle up to him and listened with one ear while she watched Eleanor and Vaughn flirt. 

"You really think this is such a good idea now?" Garland asked, tone low but sharp. 

"I'm fine, Chief. Only troubled people here are me and Nathan, right? You know he won't let me anywhere near him." 

Garland hummed noncommittally, and Audrey lost the rest of their conversation as Eleanor grabbed her arm to make introductions. 

Vaughn Carpenter had known Lucy. Audrey felt her heart rate pick up. He might have answers. Whatever presents she unwrapped today, she was sure that would be the best. She cursed internally when the power flickered, and he excused himself to check on the generators. Sometimes it seemed like the whole world was conspiring against her attempts to learn where she'd come from. 

Duke found her again before she got to her room, tugging her away from the group with a hand on her arm. "Hey." He flashed her a small smile. "So, uh. I'm not really used to social niceties anymore, but I got you a present." 

Audrey offered him a distracted grin in return. "Thanks, but I was actually going to go talk to Vaughn." 

Duke let go of her arm and dropped his head before nodding ruefully. "Right. Yeah, sorry. Later, then?" 

"Yeah." Audrey rested her hand on his shoulder the same way she'd seen Vaughn do. She couldn't imagine what it must be like for him, so used to solitude, to be here surrounded by all these people. At least one of whom couldn't seem to look at him without glaring. The lights flickered again as the storm picked up outside. She turned to leave, then paused. "Hey," she said. "I'm glad you're here." 

Duke gave her that small smile again. What was it with Maine boys and those stupid microexpressions? "Well, hey," he said. "At least someone is."

*

Getting knocked out or — brain-melted, maybe — and locked in a trunk by a shapeshifter was not the best way to spend one's birthday. And yet, Audrey wasn't ready to declare it her worst birthday ever, not when she woke up cradled against Nathan's chest, concerned faces all around her.

"Surprise?" she said weakly. "Eleanor, I think your party planning needs work." 

Julia let out a choked noise, stumbling to her feet. Vince caught her in a hug, looking pained and shaken. Audrey's stomach dropped, and she felt a flush like an ice bath as she tallied all those concerned faces. 

Eleanor was missing. So were Vaughn and Duke. 

"What —" Audrey stopped and swallowed, gathering herself and slowly sitting up. "What happened?" 

"I'm sorry," Nathan said. "Eleanor's dead." 

Audrey shivered and felt herself sway. Nathan put an arm over her shoulder, warm and steadying. Reliable. "What _happened?_" she asked again. 

"She fell down the stairs," Vince said softly, still holding onto Julia. 

"Or was pushed," said Dave. Vince shot him a dark look. 

"Vaughn," Audrey said, shivering harder. The room began to twist around her. "He — his _skin_ —" 

"We call it a chameleon," Garland said. "Kills folks and steals their faces. It's dead now, don't you worry. You're real lucky to be alive, Parker." 

Audrey didn't feel lucky. She felt sick. "A trouble?" she asked. Nathan nodded. "Did Duke —" 

"Just the final blow," Garland said. He sounded . . . satisfied. Proud. "Nathan here took it down." 

Nathan didn't look proud of himself at all. 

Vaughn Carpenter had been troubled. Nathan and Duke — together — had killed him. But Duke had said Vaughn was a friend. . . . "Where is he?" Audrey pulled away from Nathan and struggled to her feet. "Where's Duke?" 

"Safe," Garland said. He reached out to steady her, but she ducked away, staggering out into the hall. "I knocked him out before he could hurt anyone else." 

"You knocked him out?!" 

Duke had killed Vaughn, who was supposed to be his friend. Vaughn was supposed to tell her about Lucy, but he'd stolen Audrey's face instead, and Duke had killed him. But Nathan had taken him down?

"Chief's knocked out a few people today," Nathan said darkly. 

Audrey looked up and down the hallway, lit only by flashes of lightning from outside. She wondered if she'd even woken up at all. "Where?" she asked. Demanded. 

"Parker," Nathan said, suddenly behind her. "Maybe you should rest. You look like you're gonna fall over." 

"_Where is he?_" 

"Alright, cool down there, missy." Garland stepped into the hallway, carrying a lantern. "We got him secured downstairs." He started off, leading the way. Audrey lurched into the wall when she tried to follow. 

Nathan caught her. "Hey. You're okay." 

"How?" Audrey asked. She wanted to pull away from him, but needed his support if she wanted to keep up with Garland. "Vaughn was wearing my _face_. How'd you take him down?" 

"Gunshot," Nathan said, with the cold authority of an officer reporting an incident with a perp. "Upper left quadrant." His expression softened as he helped her down the stairs. "She — they — tried to talk. If it helps. . . ." He paused and took a breath, looking faintly pained by what he said next. "I think Duke just wanted to put them out of their misery." 

Audrey pulled away from him the moment they hit the first floor, leaning on the wall for support instead. "It doesn't." 

Garland had apparently "secured" Duke in the same room as the bodies. Audrey pressed her hand over her mouth when she saw Eleanor stretched out on the bed next to — next to what really looked like Audrey's own corpse, gun-shot but barely bloody, and wearing what had been a lovely blue dress. It had been surreal enough since she'd come to Haven just looking at her own face on a stranger's in an old photograph. Seeing it laid out like that, grey and dead —

Audrey tore her eyes away, swinging to the room's living occupant. Duke sat slumped in a chair in the corner, looking pale and miserable. He leaned his head on his hand and blinked up at Audrey through bloodshot eyes. He swallowed once, then looked past her to Garland. 

"My time-out over then, Chief?" 

"Did you know Vaughn was troubled?" Audrey asked. 

Duke looked at her again, not moving more than his eyes. "You mean, did I know the guy I thought was Vaughn Carpenter was really a troubled person who'd been pretending to be him for the last 30 years? No, I didn't." 

"I mean," Audrey said, putting all her frustration and anger and fear and her damn pounding head and roiling stomach into the words. "Did you know Vaughn Carpenter's blood could get you high?" 

Duke closed his eyes, and Audrey could see frustration, anger, fear, and — yeah — his own pounding headache written plain across his face. "No," he said. "I did not." 

Audrey looked back at the bodies and let everything else inside her get washed away in a tide of grief. "Right. Okay then."

*

It was hours before they managed to get a call out to the mainland, and another few after that before the boat would actually arrive. Duke hardly said a word to anyone other than to volunteer to fix the radio, but other than Vince and Dave, who seemed able to squabble over literally anything, no one else said much either. Julia helped Audrey collect her presents (some of which had been opened, and Audrey was firmly Not Asking) and take down the decorations, then excused herself to the room where her mother's body still lay. Vince and Dave wandered off not long after, then Garland claimed the need for a cigarette. He paused on the way out for a muttered conference with Nathan that quickly devolved into a mutual growl off, too low for Audrey to make out details.

It did involve a lot of small but forceful gestures at Audrey and Duke, though. 

"For chrissake, Nathan!" Garland finally said, both hands flung in the air. "It's not _Audrey_ he's dangerous around!" 

Duke flinched and set down his screwdriver. He flipped a switch and the radio came to life with a squeal and a blast of static. "Radio's fixed." He was on his feet and out the door before anyone could say another word. Nathan watched him go with an odd look on his face, then stared down at his hands. 

Garland huffed. "Well fine then. Make yourself useful and call us a ride. Then maybe go make sure that crack hasn't gotten any bigger." 

Audrey watched him go, then turned to Nathan. "Crack?" 

"In the wall." Nathan shrugged. "It's an old building." 

Audrey nodded. "The chameleon. How did you know it wasn't me?" 

Nathan looked up, but she still couldn't read his face. She missed that morning, when he'd been looser, full of wry amusement. When her birthday still had the potential to be fun, instead of a horror show. 

This birthday had finally managed to beat out the one with the clown for worst ever. 

"You're my partner," Nathan said with a shrug. "She was . . . really close. But she wasn't you." 

Audrey bit her lip. "Well. Thanks for that." She clapped her hand on his shoulder as she headed for the door. "Do me a favor though: next time you decide I'm not acting like myself, _don't_ just start shooting, okay?" 

His mouth twitched, almost but not quite a smile. "Alright." 

"Good."

*

Duke found her on the grounds not long before the boat from the mainland was due to arrive. He stopped just out of arm's reach, his hands shoved deep in his pockets again, and Audrey thought of Garland's outburst inside. That Duke wasn't a threat to her.

She wondered how he could be so sure she wasn't troubled. 

"Hey," Duke said, looking at her through that thick, long hair. "I know I'm not really someone you want to see right now, but — the boat'll be here soon. We won't have another chance to talk." 

Audrey frowned. She didn't like the sound of that. "You're not coming with us?" 

Duke shook his head. "Not going to the mainland. Mail boat should be here on Monday, I'll hitch a ride back home then." 

Home. To his empty island, where he lived because his trouble made him dangerous. Had made him kill his friend today, possibly the only one he currently had. While his friend wore Audrey's face. "You're not going to do anything stupid are you?" she asked. "I heard what you said to Thornton. About sometimes wanting to give up." 

Duke smiled sadly. "It's sweet that you're worried. But I am way too into self-preservation to actually try to kill myself." 

Audrey wasn't so sure, but she let the subject drop. "What did you want to talk about?" 

Duke pulled his hand from his pocket and held out a small box. "Happy birthday." 

Audrey shut her eyes and shook her head. "You really didn't have to —" 

"I did though." She felt him step closer, take her hand and press the box into it. "Just open it." 

Audrey gave him a cynical look and did what he asked, revealing a delicate silver locket. It was much too fine a gift to give a virtual stranger, and she was abruptly uncomfortable. Three years on an island with limited human contact meant it was probably more than just conversation he was missing. He was all but unknown to her. Nathan didn't trust him. And he was much, _much_ larger than she was. 

Duke must have seen her discomfort on her face, because he took a big step back and raised his hands. "I know." He made a face, nose wrinkling. "Believe me, I know. But look at the back." 

Audrey pulled the locket from the box and flipped it over. "L.R.?" 

"Lucy Ripley." 

Audrey's head shot up and she stared at him. 

"You're looking into her, right?" Duke asked. "Because she's your mom or something?" 

"I —" Audrey swallowed. "Yeah, I think she is. Did you know her?" 

Duke nodded. "I mean, I was a kid, and she wasn't around that long. But yeah. She kind of watched out for me after my dad died. Right before she — left — she gave me that. Told me to hang onto it."

Audrey's fingers wrapped tight around the locket, shock wrapped tight around her throat. She'd been looking for ages for someone who could just tell her about Lucy. Who knew more than her name or her photo or her favorite flowers. "Duke, I —" 

"There you are!" Dave yelled. "Audrey! The boat's here!" 

_No._ Audrey stared at Duke, all her questions caught in her throat. She wanted to scream. Wave Dave off. Kidnap Duke and throw him into an interrogation room. Anything, just to get some _answers_.

"Go," Duke said, offering her another of his sad, lonely smiles. "We'll talk later. You know where to find me." 

And he was gone, melting into the trees as Dave ran up, asking if Audrey had heard them calling. Audrey only narrowly avoided biting his head off. 

She knew where Duke would be alright. And she was going to get her answers even if she had to move to his island herself.


	5. Interlude

Duke made it a whole three months. Garland was almost impressed. Of course, it was early days yet, not too many people had been activated aside from Nathan and Duke (and Garland, he'd managed to open a crack in his own damn yard last week, after stubbing his toe on the goddamn coffee table). Haven was still quiet enough that Garland had to go through Vince to get a proper tail on the kid, one who knew the troubles and knew what to look for. Vince had suggested a young man just brought in from out of town, new to the Guard and a bit zealous about it for Garland's tastes, but a good man with military training who knew how to keep it subtle. 

Which was a nice trick, for a goddamn viking-looking fella. 

Duke spent most of his time on his boat in the harbor or out at the McShaw's place, making tailing him something of a cushy assignment. That seemed to be alright by Dwight, seeing as he was apparently still recovering from activating in Afghanistan, of all places. Was alright by Garland too, since he'd have expected Duke to take up a stool at the Shiny Scupper, which would put him much too close to Driscoll for Garland's comfort. He figured Duke likely knew about his tail — Garland had about told him outright he'd have one — and was trying to lull them into complacency, but with the troubles starting to pop up more often and in more public places, Garland was just glad not to have to worry too much about Duek's in particular for the time being. 

Then the damn fool had to go for lunch at the Gun and Rose, firmly in Guard territory. And he had to do it the same time Garland was trying to talk down a young woman in the diner's parking lot, with a scream that could shatter glass. And ear drums. 

Dwight spotted Garland first, and was standing right in the doorway when the girl shrieked, something about knowing her rights. The big man took the exploding glass right in the face and neck before dropping out of view. 

Garland grabbed the troubled girl and spun her against her car, shouting out just what her rights really were over the ringing in his ears. Especially her right to remain damn well _silent_. Thank god she started to listen then, or at least figured out the connection between her voice and the trail of busted windows and ears in her wake, and it didn't take long to get her secured, or else Garland likely would have lost one of the finest non-cops he'd had the pleasure to work with. By the time he got back to Dwight, the diner had cleared out, and Duke was already kneeling over Dwight's prone form, a wad of napkins pressed to the side of Dwight's neck. 

"No, dammit!" Garland shouted, though he could still barely hear his own voice and didn't have much hope for anyone else hearing a word he said. "Duke! He's _troubled!_" 

He could see the moment Dwight's blood soaked through the makeshift bandage to Duke's skin, even without being able to see the boy's face. He read it loud and clear in the stiffening of Duke's shoulders, in the shift of Duke's grip on Dwight's throat. 

There was only a hair's breadth of difference between holding pressure on a man's jugular and strangling him. 

The rush should have passed in a moment. The high from Nathan's blood the night of the fight had lasted only seconds. But Dwight was still bleeding, and Duke's hand still pressed into Dwight's wound. And Duke just kept getting triggered. 

Garland drew his gun. Wondered how fucked they'd be by the time the barn rolled around if this generation's Crocker was already dead. 

"Let him go, Duke!" 

He saw blood on Duke's neck, under his ear. It wasn't absorbing, so it was probably Duke's own. Garland wondered if Duke actually couldn't hear him, or if he was just refusing to listen. Wondered which option was worse. 

He took aim. 

One of the waitresses stepped sobbing around an overturned table. Garland remembered her from the station last month, where she'd been giving a statement about an assault. She reached for Duke. Garland shouted at her to stop. 

Her hand hit Duke's neck, and Duke wrenched away from Dwight with a howl, his back arching as though he'd been tased. He threw the waitress across the room, then curled his hands into his chest, panting. Garland flipped his gun in his grip and slammed it into the back of Duke's head before he could get those hands around Dwight's neck again. 

The ringing in Garland's ears resolved into the wail of sirens as he dragged Duke's limp form into the diner's cooler, where he couldn't hurt anyone else. 

The waitress, Jordan, was fine. Bruised and pissed and so, so sorry, but well enough to wrap her apron over her hand and hold pressure on Dwight's neck until the EMTs took over. Everyone else, staff and patrons alike, had cleared out while the going was good, which pissed Garland right off for all that he couldn't really blame them. Folks lived in Haven long enough, they developed an instinct for when to get the hell out of the way, and the Gun and Rose had never been popular with tourists. They'd left Jordan and Duke alone to try to deal with what turned out to be a hell of a bleeder, just missing Dwight's carotid, and Jordan, apparently well aware that her touch caused searing pain, had hesitated to touch him. 

Garland couldn't guarantee whether Duke knew Dwight was troubled or not. Knew without intervention, Dwight would likely have been dead either way. The Crocker trouble had taken what should have been first aid and turned it into a death grip. 

Duke's instinct to help had near enough gotten both him and Dwight killed. 

"Should never have put a troubled man on your tail, kid," Garland told Duke's unconscious form, once the ambulances and squad cars were all on their way. "That's on me. Trouble is — trouble is the troubled are the only ones I know I can trust. It's a damn rotten business all around." 

Duke groaned, twitching like he was working on waking up. Garland sat down on an empty milk crate and waited. 

It didn't take long. Kid came up swinging in a way that made Garland think he'd been coldcocked before. The hell kind of life had he and Lucy left the boy to, all those years ago? Too late to fix anything now, of course. Garland's bed was made. All there was left was to lie in it, best as he could. 

"You with us again then, kid?" 

"Fuck," Duke groaned, squinting in the florescent glow of the cooler. "What —" His eyes went wide and his face lost all its color. "_Fuck_." 

"Told you you'd slip up, didn't I," Garland said. He wondered if it would be against the health code to smoke in here. Decided after a long debate it wasn't worth it to find out. "And now here we are. You coulda killed that man." 

"Sasquatch," Duke muttered. Garland swallowed a snort at the nickname. "Is he —?" 

"Getting a full load of stitches and a tetanus shot as we speak," Garland said. "No thanks to you." 

"No, I — he was going to bleed out." 

"So you thought you'd strangle him instead?" It wasn't fair, and Garland hated himself even as he said it. But it didn't do to coddle boys like Duke, or Nathan either. Nothing about living in Haven through the troubles was easy. They'd have to learn the cold truths, and toughen up fast if they were going to survive. 

"_No!_" Duke sat up, fisting his hands in his hair. "I didn't want to hurt him! I didn't even know he was troubled!" 

"Can't always know ahead of time, can you," Garland said. His fingers twitched towards his pocket, where his smokes waited. "Not like there's a way to tell from the outside. Could be anyone who bleeds on you will set you off. Make you a killer." 

Duke sat with his head on his knees for a long time, shuddering. Garland waited. No one had ever had any luck forcing Duke to do anything, not since the day he was born. You could suggest, request, manipulate all you liked, but in the end, Duke had to think it was his own damn idea. 

"Are you going to kill me?" Duke asked eventually, tone almost casual. Like he didn't care about the answer. 

"Don't want to," Garland said. "You're a good kid, deep down. Always have been." 

"I'm a fucking time bomb." 

"Mm." Garland gave in and pulled out his smokes, lighting one up and dragging it deep, all the way to the base of his lungs. He wished nicotine still worked as fast as it used to. Seemed like nothing calmed him down anymore. "You're more like . . . nitroglycerin. Unstable as hell, if you aren't handled proper." 

"And you think sticking me on that island is the right way to 'handle' me." 

"I do, yeah." 

Duke uncurled a little, staring past his feet into the depths of the cooler. "I have a boat. I could just go to sea." 

"You could," Garland said. "But boats need fuel, don't they. Maintenance. They're not exactly stable places themselves." 

Duke rolled his eyes. Looked at his hands. "I'll think about it." 

A week later, Duke's boat was gone from its usual slip at the marina. Two days after that, Gus McEwan confirmed she was docked up by the little empty island a few miles east of Carpenter's Knot. 

Nathan was a terror, stalking unsteadily around on numb legs and swearing about Duke's selfishness and unreliability. About how typical it was that Duke would just run off instead of face the consequences of his actions. Garland let him do it. He was so relieved that the boy had made the right decision, it felt like a physical weight had been lifted from his chest. He even got as far as pitching out his last half-pack of cigarettes and buying a big pack of nicotine gum. 

The Crocker curse was under control. Maybe he could quit smoking after all.


	6. Cracks

Duke waited for her at the cabin this time, feet propped on the porch railing, shotgun propped on his knees. He wore a ridiculous broad-brimmed hat pulled low over his eyes, making him the perfect image of an old-timey homesteader. Brown bottle in his fist and all. 

He raised an eyebrow when he saw she was alone, tipping the hat back with the bottle's mouth. "Where's your driver?" 

"Gus?" She shrugged. "Headed back to the mainland. He'll pick me up in a couple hours." 

Duke whistled, long and low. "Must have cost you. Gus hates ferrying the summer people." 

Audrey snorted, though the reminder of Eleanor was bittersweet. "Didn't you hear? I'm a townie now." 

Duke set his gun aside and sat up, his boots clomping heavily on the decking. "Where the hell do you think I'd've heard that?" 

"What, you don't get the Haven Herald? Dave wrote a feature on me." 

Duke laughed. "My condolences." 

Audrey climbed the steps and dropped into the chair next to him, the manilla folder of all her Lucy intel on her lap. It was a very thin folder. "So. You ready to tell me all about my mom?" 

Duke stood. "What little I know. But first: coffee?" 

Audrey pointed to the bottle, still clutched in his hand. "Actually, I was thinking maybe some of that." 

Duke turned the bottle, showing her the label. "Bourbon, huh? Woman after my own heart. I'll grab some cups." He disappeared through the cabin door. 

"You usually drink straight from the bottle like that?" she called after him. It was too dark inside for her to make out much, but the interior of the cabin looked clean and cozy, a worn rug running straight out from the door. She leaned in a little, hoping to see more, but Duke reappeared a moment later, a couple of mugs in one hand, a fresh bottle in the other. 

"Perks of being a hermit," he said. Audrey moved back to her chair. "You know, it's funny. At sea I always just used glasses. Felt classier, even when it was just me and my boat and nothing else on any horizon. But here?" 

"Here you've gone cowboy?" Audrey asked, gesturing to his hat. 

He laughed. "Here I've gone cowboy. Guess I'm a product of my environment." 

Or he was depressed. 

Audrey accepted the mug of bourbon when he offered it and laid her folder on the crate-table, flipping it open. It wasn't her business if he was depressed or not. He was troubled, sure, but his trouble was already being managed. She wouldn't intrude unless she was asked. 

"So I really don't know much," she said. "Until you I didn't even have a last name. I know she was here in 1983. I know she didn't talk to a lot of people while she was here, or at least didn't leave much of an impression on people unless they were troubled. I know — she bought flowers." Daisies, snapdragons, and orchids. She had no idea who they were for. "And I know this happened." She pulled out the Colorado Kid photo and passed it to him, watching his reaction carefully. 

"That's not a lot," he said, sipping his bourbon, his mouth turned down at the edges. "You asked Nathan about all this?" 

"Of course," Audrey said. "He's my partner." 

"Huh." He set the photo back on top of the folder. "I'm asking because that?" He tapped the dark-haired child clutching Lucy's hand. "That's me. It's not a great copy, but I'm surprised Nathan didn't recognize me. We, uh. Knew each other pretty well, back then." 

"Seriously?" Audrey leaned in close to the photo, looking from the blurry, photocopied face of the boy to Duke's goateed and shadowed one. It wasn't too surprising Nathan hadn't said anything. Audrey was looking right at him and barely saw the resemblance. "So what happened? Who was the Colorado Kid? How'd he die?" 

Duke spread his hands. "No idea." 

"Well, how'd you end up down on the beach that day? Did you find the body?" 

"I don't know." Duke shook his head, taking a larger belt of his bourbon. "I don't actually remember anything about that morning. I never have." 

Audrey's heart sank. She'd been pinning so much on this conversation. She'd really thought she'd finally get some answers. And he couldn't remember anything? Sure, he'd been, what, eight years old, but nothing at all? 

Had the experience been that traumatic? 

"What about the other people in the photo? Do you know any of them?" 

Duke shrugged. "No helpful photo caption, huh? Who's who, left to right?" Audrey shook her head and he clicked his tongue. "Figures. Those Teagues are terrible journalists." He scanned the photo again, brows bunched together, and pointed to a girl off to the side. "Her. Vanessa . . . something. Stanley. She was my babysitter." 

It was hard to picture Duke ever needing a babysitter. Not until she looked at the younger version in the photo again, and the way he half-hid behind Lucy. 

"Don't suppose you stayed in touch?" 

Duke shook his head and shrugged. "Did you keep in touch with your babysitter?" 

"I was a foster kid," Audrey said. "I had nothing _but_ babysitters." She tapped the photo. "You're holding onto Lucy pretty hard here. And she gave you that locket. How close were you two?" 

Duke smiled faintly. "Pretty close. I told you my dad died, right?" Audrey nodded. "It was a little while before that picture was taken. A boating accident." He rubbed his hand over his mouth, sipped his bourbon, and went on. "I was with him. Had to be rescued by the Coast Guard. When we got to shore, she was there." He frowned. "I never knew why she was waiting for me. She wasn't CPS or anything. At the time I was just glad I wasn't alone." 

Audrey nodded. She had a few memories like that one herself. The occasional foster home that wasn't terrible. The few adults who seemed to actually care. 

"I remember hoping she'd adopt me. Guess that would have made us siblings, huh?" Duke tilted his head and sighed. "I was always too afraid to ask her, though, and then — she disappeared. Pretty much right after that photo was taken. Never saw her again." 

"Until I showed up with the Chief." 

"I didn't recognize you at first, you know," he said. "Wasn't until Vaughn started talking about inviting you out to the Knot that I made the connection." 

Audrey stiffened. "I thought you said you didn't know about Vaughn." 

"I believe I said I didn't know he was a face-stealing murderer. Not that I didn't know he knew Lucy." 

That was a fair point. 

"Even if I had noticed the resemblance, I probably wouldn't have said anything right away. 'Hi, I'm Duke, I wanted your mom to be my mom when I was eight. Nice to meet you.' My people skills aren't _that_ rusty." 

Audrey had to laugh at that. She couldn't quite get a handle on Duke. One moment he was charming and open, the next cagey and creepy. She couldn't quite decide which was the real Duke, the person he'd been before his trouble had turned his life on its head. Maybe neither of them. Trauma had a tendency to change a person. 

"So Vanessa Stanley," she said. "Think if you introduced us, she'd talk to me?" 

Duke quirked an eyebrow at her. "I haven't spoken to her in more than 10 years," he said. "Also, I'm a hermit." 

"You went to a slumber party last week —" 

"— A _murder_ party —" 

"— An overnight, destination birthday party. For a virtual stranger. You're a really bad hermit." 

"Be that as it may. I'm not going back to the mainland just to stalk my old babysitter." 

"Fair enough," Audrey said. "How about calling her?" 

"Dunno," Duke said. But by the way he smiled, she could tell he was going to do it. "The sat phone's only supposed to be for emergencies." 

"I could always commandeer it," Audrey offered. 

Duke shook his head and raised his hands. "No need for that, Officer Parker. I'll make the introduction. But you'll owe me." 

Audrey sipped her bourbon and shrugged. "I'm sure we'll think of something."

*

Duke knelt by the blanket where Vanessa had died well after the ambulance had taken her body away. He looked strangely still in the flashing red and blue lights of the police vehicles, staring down at his hands on his lap. He didn't move as Audrey approached, didn't flinch when Nathan crouched down in front of him.

"Duke?" Nathan asked, voice softer than Audrey had heard from him before. 

"I didn't kill her," Duke said. His voice was raw, scraped over asphalt. 

"We know, Duke," Audrey said, resting her hand on his shoulder. Duke jerked away. 

"I barely touched her." 

Nathan nodded. "It's alright." 

Duke jerked his head up, mouth twisted in fury. "It's not 'alright', Nathan, I couldn't _touch_ her. She was dying right in front of me and I —" He got to his feet, a single, fluid movement despite his angry, jittery energy. "I couldn't even do first aid, because if she bled on me, I might've _killed_ her. What the hell am I even doing here?! Audrey killed that other kid just fine without me!" 

Audrey swallowed hard. She didn't regret what happened to Matt; he was dangerous, and managed to prove pretty quickly that he couldn't be trusted with control of his trouble. If she hadn't set him off here, he would have gone off elsewhere, possibly — even likely — at school, where he would take who knew how many others with him. 

No, she didn't regret doing it at all, as much as she wished it hadn't happened. 

Duke looked between Nathan and Audrey, an expression of pure disgust on his face. "Jesus, Nathan. You refused to look at me after your father even hinted that I'd killed someone, but her, you don't even blink, do you. You gave _me_ shit because _Audrey_ called me for backup on this, but when she _talks a kid into exploding_, you're all 'it had to be done'." 

Nathan didn't look at Audrey. He stood and faced Duke, expression calm and resolute. "Yeah," he said. "It did." 

"Why?" Duke asked. "What's the difference between her and me?" He wore a grim sort of smile now, one that told Audrey he knew exactly what Nathan's response would be, and exactly what to say to hit Nathan back the hardest. 

Nathan didn't bite, though. He held his ground and stared Duke down, like he was waiting for a child to finish his tantrum. 

Duke broke first, moving into Nathan's space. "Because she's a cop? Is that it, Nathan?" He'd held himself so stiff since getting to the mainland, hands shoved into his pockets, elbows pressed tight to his ribs. His arms were loose now, in motion and taking up space. Like he was finally unafraid. Like he welcomed the touch of Nathan's blood. "Or is it because it's me. Unreliable, untrustworthy Duke. I bet you wish your dad locked me up that night, huh. 'Assault on an officer.' You wish he'd thrown away the key." 

Nathan didn't flinch. His expression didn't shift an inch, though Audrey could see his hands curling into fists at his sides. She wondered if he even realized he was doing that. "Not particularly." 

Duke stared at him, shoulders heaving, his face inches from Nathan's. His hands were clenched too, and Audrey could see his awareness of that fact written in every line of his body. 

Nathan was doing the same thing to Duke that Audrey had done to Matt, she realized. Riling him up on purpose to see if he'd explode. Except Duke wasn't a powderkeg. Wasn't a frustrated kid full of hormones and rage. Duke was a full grown adult, a man so determined not to blow that he lived miles out to sea, far away from everyone he knew. From any temptation to give in. 

He hadn't wanted to come to the mainland today, but he had because Audrey had asked him to. He'd gotten on the boat she'd sent him, met them at the police station, and helped them track down a murderous trouble, all because Audrey said that they needed his help. He was right to be angry. He should be furious about what he'd become, what the troubles had turned him into. But he couldn't be. He didn't have the luxury of fury anymore. 

And Nathan was provoking him anyway. 

Audrey watched as Duke's fingers slowly uncurled, though he continued to stare into Nathan's face. "Do me a favor," he said, voice little more than a croak. "Next time, find someone else to be your executioner." He stepped back, chin held high, and met Audrey's gaze. "Seems to me you've got a good candidate lined up already." 

Audrey flinched. Duke turned away, only to be brought up short by Nathan's hand on his wrist. 

"You're alright, Duke." 

Duke yanked his arm away with a disgusted noise. Nathan grabbed him again. 

"You're _alright_, Duke." Nathan shook him a little. "Let the Chief take you home." 

"Nah." Duke shook his head with that cold, calculated smile. "I can find my own ride, thanks." 

This time when he pulled away, Nathan let him go.

*

They'd made a mistake.

That was all Audrey could think as she stood on the front porch of Duke's cabin, waiting for an answer she was sure wasn't coming. Three deliveries' worth of mail and supplies sat untouched on the dock below. Audrey had tried calling Duke on his satellite phone; Nathan had sent so many messages over the radio that the Coast Guard had finally asked him to stop. 

Audrey knocked again — pounded, really — then shouted through the door that she was coming in. The abandoned supplies on the dock were enough probable cause not to require a warrant. She grabbed the knob and was startled to realize it was locked. 

"It's a deserted island!" She shoved her shoulder against the door in frustration. "Who locks their door when literally no one else lives here?" 

"Duke would," Nathan said, startling Audrey. He came around the cabin and climbed the porch steps. "Woods look clear. No sign anyone's been out there in weeks." 

"Your friend is paranoid," Audrey told him. She bumped her shoulder into the door again. "This is ridiculous." 

"The Chief knows about this place," Nathan said. "Probably well enough to sneak up if he wanted to." Audrey frowned at him and he shrugged. "Duke never liked being snuck up on." 

And yet he'd let the Chief move him out here. Jesus, his trouble must really have scared the shit out of him. 

Nathan offered to break the door in for her, but Audrey refused. She took a step back, squared her hips, and _kicked_, aiming for just next to the knob. The door popped open with a creak and she smirked. 

"Not bad, Parker." Nathan gave her an amused nod. She waved him in ahead of her and drew her gun, following him in with it held low by her hip. 

"Duke!" Nathan called. "Duke, are you in here?" He tilted his head and listened. "Duke! Are you hurt?" 

Nothing. Audrey was increasingly certain Duke wasn't here. She scanned the cabin. It consisted of one main room, large and comfortable, with hardwood floors and warm, exotic-looking rugs. A small loft along the back wall seemed to serve as the bedroom, the timbers holding it up weather-beaten and solid. The interior walls were the same quarried stone as the exterior; a fireplace along one wall was matched by a wood stove on the other to warm the place against the Maine winters. Both were clearly cold; a fine layer of dust coated the top of the stove. A threadbare couch sat in front of the fireplace, a thick book resting face-down and open on a barrel-shaped end table. Two glasses sat on the wooden table by the stove, the same two, Audrey was sure, that she'd drunk bourbon from with Duke the morning she'd asked him about Lucy. 

"Nathan," Audrey said, staring at the residue coating the bottom of one of the glasses. "I don't think he ever came back." 

Nathan didn't answer. He held a framed photo he'd pulled off the mantelpiece. Audrey came to look and saw a photo of the cabin, surrounded by patchy, melted snow. Duke sat on the porch steps, looking younger and more relaxed than she'd ever known him. A young man stood beside him on the ground, leaning back on the porch railing, grinning down at Duke. Audrey frowned. 

"I thought — he said he never got visitors. He's supposed to be out here alone." 

But he'd been friends with Vaughn Carpenter, hadn't he. Maine was an odd place; there could be a whole network of recluses out here, young and old, bouncing from island to island. 

"The man he's with isn't troubled," Nathan said. "He'd be perfectly safe with Duke." 

Audrey looked at the man in the picture again. "How can you be sure?" 

Nathan set the photo back on the mantel firmly. The frame, Audrey noticed, didn't have any glass in it. Because he didn't want to risk it breaking, she wondered, or because it already had? Duke wasn't supposed to keep any sharp objects out here. 

"Because," Nathan said. "That's Jack Driscoll." 

"Driscoll?" Audrey asked. "As in —" 

"Yeah," Nathan said. "The Reverend Driscoll's nephew."

*

"Jack Driscoll?" Audrey called as she and Nathan walked down the docks. A clean cut man with a carefully trimmed beard looked up from — some boat thing, Audrey guessed. It was salt-crusted and mechanical and probably not a lobster trap, which about hit the limit of her expertise.

"Nathan," the man said, and shielded his eyes when he looked at Audrey. "Ma'am. What can I do for you?" 

"Detective Audrey Parker." Audrey held up her badge. "We have a few questions for you, if you don't mind." 

"Right." Jack nodded. "You're the FBI agent." 

"Former," Audrey said. It still left an odd taste in her mouth. Agent Howard had not been pleased when she'd quit rather than go back to Boston. 

"You seen Duke lately?" Nathan asked. 

Jack scoffed. "No one's seen him lately. I heard he ran off to Moscow three years ago." 

"You sure about that?" Audrey held out the photo from Duke's mantel, watching Jack's reaction carefully. All he did was raise his eyebrows and shrug. 

"That's out by the Knot, right? We found that place a few years ago. Had some fun exploring, took some pictures." He held it together well right up to the end, when his eyes flicked nervously away. "Where, uh. Where'd you find it?" 

"On the mantel of that cabin," Nathan said, almost conversationally. "Where Duke's been living the last three years." 

Jack laughed just a second too late, his poker face starting to crack in earnest now. "No shit? What the hell's he been doing out there?" 

"Managing his affliction," Audrey said. "But you knew that, didn't you." 

Jack rocked back half a step. 

"You're not in any trouble," Nathan said, and Audrey was sure she heard an unspoken 'yet' at the end of that sentence. Jack seemed to too, becoming instantly defensive. 

"Damn right I'm not." He narrowed his eyes at them both, arms folded across his chest. "The Driscolls and the Crockers are what hold this town together. You can't stop me from taking care of my friend." 

"You're not troubled —" Audrey started. 

"Of course not." Jack frowned. "I'm a Driscoll." 

"Driscolls have never been troubled," Nathan said. "Their reputation's built on it." 

"Not until Hannah adopted that Bobby kid." Jack's frown deepened. "For the best, her skipping town." 

"You're not troubled," Audrey said again, daring them both with her eyes to try to interrupt her. "So Duke figured you were safe, right? He trusted you?" 

Jack sighed, visibly forcing himself to calm. "Much as he trusts anyone." He shot Nathan a look. "Your father really did a number on him." 

"Yeah." Nathan's expression didn't move. "He does that." 

Jack nodded, some of the venom draining out of him at that. "What's this about?" he asked, sounding honestly curious and concerned. "Did something happen to Duke? Is he okay?" 

"That's what we're trying to find out," Audrey said. "When's the last time you saw him?" 

"Awhile ago." Jack gave her a measuring look. "Would've been before you got to town." 

"You didn't give him a ride?" Nathan asked. "About two weeks ago? Night of the Dockside Green — gas leak." 

Jack shook his head. "A ride where? He never goes anywhere. That boat of his is just rusting out there." 

"He did that day." Audrey continued to study Jack. He was good; most of what he was telling them was the truth, she was sure. Just enough of it to throw them off of whatever he wasn't telling them. "He was here. On the mainland." 

Jack looked her dead on, then, a challenge. "Only one reason he'd come to the mainland." 

"Did he ask you for a ride back to the island that night?" Nathan asked, voice hard. Jack snapped that challenging gaze to him. 

"Yes," he said, biting the word out. "But I couldn't give him one. My boat's been dry-docked for months." He narrowed his eyes. "It keeps getting cracks." 

The word hung in the air between them. A muscle in Nathan's jaw jumped. Audrey gave him a long look, then turned back to Jack. "Is there anyone else you can think of who Duke may have asked for a ride?" 

Jack shrugged. "Sure. Duke's a good guy. He's got contacts all over Haven." 

"Anyone in particular?" Nathan asked. 

"Bill McShaw?" 

Nathan gave him a small shake of his head. "Bill's troubled." 

Jack's face fell, as though Nathan had told him Bill had a terminal disease. "Damn. That's too bad. Is that how Geoff —" He broke off with another small curse, not even waiting for an answer. "That explains why their place is boarded up. Is it true it's becoming a Lobster Pup?" 

"Might be." 

"Shame." Jack stepped back again, looking over the water. "That's a damn shame." He looked back at Audrey, face almost blank, save for a dull, burning anger in his eyes. "Someone ought to do something." 

Audrey stared back at him, refusing to rise to the bait. "Thank you for your time, Mr. Driscoll." 

"If you think of anything else," Nathan said. Jack smiled coldly. 

"If I think of anything else, Wuornos, I know which officers to call." He turned back to his work on the boat — engine or whatever it was — and Nathan tugged Audrey around to head back to the Bronco. 

"Do you believe him?" she asked, voice low. "About his boat?" 

"Easy enough to check," Nathan said. 

"Cracked." Audrey climbed into the truck, frowning through the windshield as Nathan got in the other side. "He said 'cracked'. Like Duke's boat." 

"And the roads," Nathan agreed. 

"And the hotel on Carpenter's Knot. Some of that could be random, but both boats? _And_ the Knot?" 

"You think someone with a crack trouble is targeting Duke?" 

"I think plenty of troubled people would be afraid of him, if they knew what he could do." She frowned harder, trying to force the pieces together in her head. There were too many missing still, connecting Duke to Lucy to the Driscolls to the troubled. To cracks. "'The Driscolls and the Crockers hold this town together'," she quoted. "What do you think that means?" 

Nathan put the Bronco into gear and streered it back onto the road towards town. "I think it means it's time to talk to the Teagues."

*

"Audrey, Nathan," Vince greeted as they entered the Herald's offices. "What brings you by? Has there been another trouble?" He was as wide-eyed and affable as ever, and Audrey couldn't help but smile at him.

"Maybe," she said. "We're not sure yet." 

"Where's Dave?" Nathan asked. 

"Oh, out getting coffee, I suppose," Vince said. "He always gets knackered in the afternoons." He bustled about, pulling up a couple of chairs. "Sit, sit! What can I do for you both?" 

Audrey sat. Nathan leaned against the counter by the window, looking faintly irritated. "We were wondering what you could tell us about the Driscolls," Audrey said. 

"Oh my," said Vince. "Well. I'm not sure what I can tell you that you won't already know. You met the Reverend, of course. And his daughter Hannah and Nathan are old friends." 

"Historically," Nathan said. "They've been in Haven awhile?" 

"I should say so!" Vince sat back in his chair, expression going distant. "Why, I think there've been Driscolls in Haven since the very beginning. And not a one of them troubled, not even married into the family. Remarkable thing." 

"What about the Crockers?" Nathan asked. Vince frowned and blinked up at him. 

"What _about_ the Crockers?" 

"Do they go back that far, too?" Audrey asked. 

"Oh. Yes, I suppose so. Much smaller family than the Driscolls, even a hundred years ago, and I'm afraid they were usually too poor or solitary to have left much of a mark on the historical record. The Driscolls have always been community leaders. The Crockers . . . less so." 

"Were they friends?" Audrey asked. "The Driscolls and the Crockers?" 

"I'm sure I have no idea," Vince said, a beat too late and sharper than usual. "What's all this about?" 

Audrey glanced at Nathan. He caught her eye and shrugged. Audrey sighed. The Teagues tended to know at least a little about everything in this town. If anyone might know what happened to Duke or where he'd be hiding, it'd be them. 

"Duke's gone missing." Audrey watched a thunderstorm roll over Vince's face. "Jack Driscoll was one of the last people we know of who talked to him."

"_Damn_ that boy." Vince's fist cracked against the desk. Audrey leaned back in her seat, startled. "I told Garland. Nothing good would come of Duke returning to town." 

"You knew," Nathan said. "Even before Carpenter's Knot." 

"I did," Vince confirmed. "Helped get Duke settled." He shook his head. "I had such hopes." 

"Hopes for what?" Audrey asked. 

"That he'd manage his trouble. That he wouldn't follow his father into the dark." 

"He is managing," Nathan said, voice cold. Vince shook his head sympathetically. 

"Every generation believes they'll be different. That they won't make the same mistakes their parents did. Simon Crocker was a dear friend of mine. A good, strong man. Yet the bloodlust still consumed him. I'm afraid Duke was doomed the very moment your blood touched him on that boat, Nathan." 

Nathan's jaw clenched. He folded his arms defensively over his chest. But he didn't disagree. "And the Driscolls?" he asked. 

"As I said," Vince answered darkly. "You've met the Rev." 

Reverend Driscoll had been willing to sell out his own daughter the moment he even thought she might be troubled. And if what Vince had said about those who'd married in was true, his bigotry went back a long, long way. Audrey didn't want to think about what he'd be willing to do to — or with — Duke. "We have to find him." 

Nathan straightened from his lean. "Should have checked the church first thing." 

Audrey was already on her feet, heading for the door. She wondered if it could possibly be so easy. Even if the Rev did have Duke, would he be daring or foolish enough to keep him somewhere so public? 

Was he keeping Duke at all? Or had Duke gone to him on purpose? 

"Nathan," Vince said, stopping them both in their tracks. "If Duke is working with Driscoll. . . ."

Nathan narrowed his eyes, brows low. "We'll handle it." And he was out the door, Audrey close on his heels. 

"See that you do," she heard Vince say as the door swung shut again. "See that you do."


	7. Interlude

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fair warning: the trouble du jour of this chapter is not terribly explicit, but very gross.

"Look at this, Garland." Vince slapped a folder down on Garland's desk and _loomed_, like that had ever done more than just rile Garland up. Like he didn't know the man too well to ever be intimidated by him. Garland stared back, letting him know full well how unimpressed he was by the tantrum, before picking up the folder and looking over its contents. 

"It's a shopping list." He dropped it back on his desk and looked at Vince again. "So?" 

"So," Vince blustered, looking to his brother. "'So,' he says!" 

"It's Duke Crocker's shopping list," Dave said. "And just look at what's on it. Kobe steaks? Swordfish?" 

"_Truffles!_" Vince jabbed his finger at the list. "And this! Oona gee? I don't even know what that is!" 

Garland glanced at the list again. Unagi. "Sushi thing," he guessed. "Some kind of fish." 

"Eel," Dave said, voice grave. "He's asking for _fresh eel_. That's a million dollar industry!" 

"Jason Dooley near got his head blown off by an eel poacher upstate last month!" Vince shook his head. "Activated his trouble, poor man. Now he's being tried for arson!" 

"That's not Duke's fault," Garland pointed out. The Teagues were good friends, but they could keep going like this for days if they weren't interrupted on the regular. 

"And this!" Dave flipped the grocery list out of the way, revealing another page. "_Satellite TV?_ We don't even have satellite TV!" 

"You want to give him cable?" Garland asked. 

"He barely has electricity out there," Vince said. "What does he need a satellite dish for?" 

Garland sighed. "He's being a brat, boys, I'll give you that. Still, setting him up with whatever he needs is part of the deal." 

"Needs," Vince scoffed. 

"No man _needs_ eel," said Dave. 

"Or satellite TV." 

"Or truffles!" 

"Now don't get your panties in a wad," Garland said, holding up his hand and eyeing the door. Nathan's office was just next door, and the last thing he needed was Nathan yelling at him over all this too. "He's just testing you, seeing what he can get away with. Ain't like you two can't afford it." 

"That's hardly the point," Vince said, fussy as the day he was born. "We wouldn't need to pay at all if you'd kept Nathan away like you were supposed to. Duke never should have been activated in the first place." 

"Nathan hasn't listened to a damn word I've said since he was a teenager," Garland said, his fingers twitching. He hadn't had a smoke since before bed last night, his longest run in years. He wasn't going to light one up now. "And if you think Duke Crocker wouldn't have been bled on by a trouble sooner than later in this town —" 

"He shouldn't be _in_ this town," Vince said. "Why the hell did he come back?" 

"You don't think Simon could have told him, could he?" Dave asked. "Before he died?" 

"None of the details," Garland said. "Nah, he was sure he wasn't troubled right up till he socked Nathan in the nose, I'm sure of that." He flipped through the rest of the folder, snorting at a few of the wilder requests — Cuban cigars, prescription drugs, _conjugal visits_, damn smug little asshole — then closed it up and handed it back to Vince. "No point in arguing 'what if's now. Fact is, we don't want another crazed Crocker on our hands before Lucy even gets here, and this is the cost of doing business." Dave opened his mouth to protest, and Garland shook his head. "You want him staying on that island, you gotta keep him happy. End of story." 

"That's just it, Garland," Vince said, eyes intent. "He's not staying on the island." 

Garland felt his stomach start to crawl up the back of his throat. "The hell're you talking about?" 

"The _Cape Rouge_ has been spotted at anchor off the coast three times in the last two weeks." 

Garland spat out a whole slew of curses, his cigarettes out of his pocket and in his hands before he'd even realized he'd reached for them. Vince had the damn gall to look smug. Garland's phone rang before he could open his trap though, thank god. Garland glared him down even as he answered. 

"Go ahead, Laverne." 

"Incident reported up at the clinic, Chief. Sounds like one of _those_ cases." 

Dammit, that was the second one this month. Garland tried to remember if the troubles had ramped up this quickly the last time. Of course, last time he'd barely made detective by the time Lucy had arrived. Who knew how many incidents had gone unreported back then, or had just been covered by someone else. 

Vince and Dave. Dollars to donuts they knew. 

Garland told Laverne he was on his way, and gave her strict instructions to keep anyone else from heading to the crime scene. As far as most of his officers knew, Haven was still a perfectly normal town, and he was damned if he wouldn't preserve that innocence as long as possible. Not that it said much about them as cops if they couldn't see what was going on right in front of them. 

"You'll excuse me, boys," Garland said, pushing between them to head for the door. "I've got work to do." 

"It's him, isn't it," Dave said gravely. "It's starting." 

Garland paused at the door and sighed. "I'll let you two know as soon as I do." 

The clinic was a wreck by the time Garland got there. The trouble did something to people's blood, turning everyone in range, it seemed, into a hemophiliac. There was blood _everywhere_, smeared on the walls, pooling on the floors. The waiting room was soaked in it, full of panicking patients clinging to what had previously been minor wounds, and desperately professional staff telling them to elevate their limbs, drink some water, and _breathe_. Garland took his own shuddering breath, taking in the chaos, and hurried across the room to where Dwight crouched, talking quietly and urgently to one of the few people in the room who wasn't visibly hemorrhaging. 

"Chief," Dwight said, sounding relieved. "This is Megan. Her family trouble affects bodily fluids." 

Megan grimaced, rocking forward over her knees. Garland gave her a narrow look. She was young, likely around Nathan's age, maybe younger, and white as a sheet, though her eyes were focussed. Determined. Worried as all get out, but not panicked. Good. 

"You know about your trouble," Garland said. Megan nodded. 

"We've always known. It's tied to fear. Disgust. Whatever grosses us out just — pours out of everyone around us. For me it was mucus." 

"Was," Garland said. He coughed into his fist, feeling something dislodge in his throat, and swallowed it back. Damn smoker's cough. "It's changed?" 

Megan shook her head. "It triggered when I was in Kindergarten. The whole class just —" Dwight grimaced and Megan gave him a tight smile. "Yeah. After awhile I just got desensitized. It hasn't bothered me since." 

"But now?" Garland prompted. Megan's color faded again, and she rocked forward, her hand to her mouth. 

"My — my son. He's five. He can't stand the — the sight of _blood_ —" She shut her eyes and sobbed once, bending nearly double. Dwight rubbed her back. 

"It's alright now, Megan," Garland told her. "We'll take care of him. Where's your son now?" 

"He broke his arm," Megan said. "We were being careful, making sure he didn't look at any other patients, but he must've — they took him back for an x-ray and Arnaud went with him. He must've seen something." She looked up at Garland, eyes like saucers. "I had no idea it could be this bad." 

Behind him, Garland heard the distinct sound of a body slumping to the floor. He didn't turn. 

"Won't sugar coat it, Megan," he said. "This is bad. But we're gonna take care of it, alright?" He offered her his hand. When she took it, he nodded and tugged her to her feet. "What's your boy's name, then?" 

"Stefan," Megan said, sniffling. (_Mucus_, Garland thought, and managed not to shudder.) "Stefan Boucher." 

"That's a good name," Garland told her, and turned to grab the arm of a passing staff member. "Could you take this woman back to see her son?" 

The staff member, dressed in bloodied scrubs, gave Garland a wild-eyed look, clutching a pile of gauze to his chest. "Sir, I don't have the time —" 

Garland cut him off by holding up his badge. "You do if you want this to end, son. Take her and find Stefan Boucher, and do _whatever_ it takes to calm that little boy down. Sedate him if you have to." 

"Sir —" 

"Dammit, boy, there's no time to mess around." 

The staff member nodded quickly, shoved the gauze into Garland's hands, and gestured for Megan to follow. Megan sobbed again, just once, then straightened her shoulders and headed after him. Say what you would about Haven, she bred them true and strong. 

Garland watched her go, handed the gauze off to another bloodied staff member, and turned to assess the chaos. Dwight straightened up next to him. 

"Chief," he said, voice low and urgent. "Duke —" 

"We are not bringing Duke in on this," Garland snapped. Dammit all to hell, his blood pressure couldn't take this. His lungs couldn't take this. He heard something creak behind him and grimaced. 

The walls couldn't take this. 

"I'm not having him kill a five year old boy. His mother either." 

"Uh. _Yeah._" Dwight boggled at Garland a moment. Garland resisted the urge to smack that look off his face. "I mean Duke is _here_." 

Garland cursed, reaching out to brace himself on a chair, only to pull his hand back sticky with blood. It was, quite literally, everywhere. "What in god's name is he doing here?! This is the last place he should be!" 

"I know that," Dwight said, still outwardly calm, but with a faint sharpening edge to his voice. "He cut himself chopping wood this morning and came in for stitches. Barricaded himself into a supply closet when he couldn't get out of the building without touching anything." 

"Shit." Garland's jaw clenched, fingers twitching towards his pocket. He reigned himself in. "Where?" 

Dwight led him down the hall, to where a couple of security guards and a doctor were crowded around a closet door. One of the guards moved to slam his shoulder into the door, only to be brought up short by the doctor, yelling about bruising and internal bleeding. 

"You got keys, don't you?" Garland asked. The security guard shook his head. 

"It's unlocked. Something's jammed into the hinges, keeping it closed." 

"There's a man in there," the doctor said, pointing to a thin red puddle oozing out from under the door. "He's stopped responding. We _have_ to get in." 

Garland looked at Dwight. "How bad was he hurt?" 

"Not bad. Just in a place he can't stitch himself." The doctor let out a choked noise. Dwight ignored him. "Wouldn't be life threatening, except." He shrugged. 

"Yeah." Garland sighed and looked at the door. His hands shook. He thought of everything this town had put him through. About his dead wife and his strained relationship with his son. About assuming first thing that the good, kind man beside him wanted to have a five year old boy killed. About Nathan at five, proudly introducing his mom's new boyfriend to his best friend from school. About Nathan and Duke, at five, at eight, at fifteen, at thirty. Bouncing towards and away from each other until even they couldn't tell if they were still friends. About Simon's blood on Garland's hands, and Duke's blood on the floor. 

The door cracked, splitting in two from top to bottom, and collapsed to the floor. 

Two hours and two bags of fluids later, Garland loaded a very wobbly Duke into his car. Two people were dead, thanks to Stefan Boucher's trouble, and Haven was officially experiencing a critical blood shortage. Garland had called into the station, ordering every cop eligible to go donate, and hoped it'd be enough. Vince came up with a bandage on his arm before Garland could get into the car. 

"I've sent the Guard to take the _Cape Rouge_ back to the island," he said, leaning in close. "They had to tow it. It's been cracked." 

Garland nodded without looking at him. Wondered when he'd managed that one. Couldn't bring himself to regret it. 

"We'll order Duke what he needs, Garland," Vince continued. "But he cannot leave that island again."

"It was a medical emergency, Vince," Garland said. "He came here, to a small clinic, instead of up to the Ping. He had no way of knowing a damned bleeding trouble would be here at the same time." 

"I've taken the liberty of asking my men to remove the offending axe from the island." Vince glanced at Duke and rolled his shoulders back. "Along with every other blade they can find. They'll do the same with the Bouchers' home. If the Guard has its way, neither Stefan nor Duke will encounter blood again until this is over." 

Garland stared at him as he reached into his pocket for his cigarettes. "That's the trouble with you, Vince. You got no sense of scale." 

"Better that trouble than some, Garland." Vince leaned over and knocked on the window where Duke was dozing. "And no satellite TV!" 

Duke glared blearily at him and raised his middle finger. 

"Kids these days," Garland said when Vince squawked. "No respect." 

"You take him home, Garland," Vince ordered, as though Garland had ever been a part of his Guard. "And remember what I said: Duke Crocker must not come into Haven again."


	8. Under the Surface

They got a call halfway to the church. What had seemed like a simple case of harassment best left to uniformed officers had turned out to be trouble-related; a young boy had had a seizure and disappeared in front of his mother's face. They split up, Audrey heading to the house of the troubled family while Nathan went to the church. 

He reported in by text a few hours later: there was no sign of Duke at the church. Just the Rev, leering creepily at Nathan and telling him to beg for God's forgiveness. As though Nathan had simply chosen to be troubled. 

Audrey wondered how many other Haven residents felt the same way. She watched Tracy Garrick hold her son to her chest and hoped against hope the Rev was in the minority. 

"It's not a permanent fix," Audrey told her. It was easier to focus on that, on Tracy and her children and how they'd cope now that they knew the truth, than to think about what James Garrick had just told her. "What happened to your husband could still happen to Michael." 

Tracy nodded without looking up, running her hands over and over her son's head. "We'll be careful. We'll be so, _so_ careful." 

Audrey wasn't sure anymore if "careful" could be enough. But she only knew of one permanent trouble fix, and even if Duke weren't missing, she wasn't about to ask him to kill a child. James probably would have volunteered, but it was too late for that. All they could do was hope that the Garricks could hold out until the troubles ended. 

Assuming they ever did. 

Lucy had helped the troubled, just like Audrey did now. She'd worked with them, held them together even as their bodies tried to fall apart. She'd spent time with Duke as well, after his father died — Duke claimed it was an accident, but Audrey wondered. He could easily have been murdered or killed in self-defense, all because of his trouble. Duke's trouble. Had Simon's death ended things last time? Had the Colorado Kid's, whoever he really was? 

It couldn't have been Lucy's; Lucy wasn't dead, not physically. The enormous scar on Audrey's foot proved that. 

Nathan called, likely wondering where she was. She'd left the Garrick's house ages ago. Audrey weighed her phone in her hand, staring out to sea, and rejected the call. She couldn't deal with Nathan right now. Or the search for Duke. Or anyone else's troubles, magic or mundane. It was painfully selfish, she knew, but she only had room in her head right now for herself. 

Haven's waterfront wasn't deserted enough for her right now. After dealing with unsolicited advice from a nosy, cryptic older man, Audrey fled, driving aimlessly around town. She didn't want to go home — wasn't really certain she had one in the first place. Her place in Boston had never been home; neither had any of the myriad of foster homes or dormitories she'd lived in growing up. Her room at the motel was as cozy as any other she'd lived in, but it was hardly _hers_. And even there, she'd be surrounded by people.

There was only one place in Haven that she could think of that might be as empty as she needed. The Second Chance. At least at a boarded up restaurant, she might really manage to be alone. 

Of course, Haven managed to thwart her there, too. 

She didn't see him until she was nearly underneath him; he'd chosen his spot with care. His gray, white, and black clothing blended neatly with the weather beaten building. She might not have known he was there at all if he didn't happen to idly kick one leg while she was looking in the right direction. She stepped out onto the decking below his perch and shielded her eyes. 

"Duke. What are you doing here?" 

Duke stilled, staring out to sea. Deciding, she thought, if he was going to run. Then he resumed kicking his legs, beating a slow, soft tattoo against the deck. 

"Officer Parker. Going to arrest me for trespassing?" 

"Not unless Bill McShaw presses charges." 

Duke lifted a bottle to his lips. Audrey couldn't see exactly what it was, but she could guess. "He can't, actually. He sold the place this morning." 

Ah. Audrey had wondered when that sale would go through. "John Roberts finally bought him out, huh?" 

"Nope." Duke popped the P cheerfully. Audrey could picture his smirk, though she was at the wrong angle to actually see it. "Turns out someone offered Bill a better deal." 

Audrey frowned. "Who?" 

"Me." 

Audrey blinked. It had never occurred to her that Duke might have money, though she supposed living as a hermit at least required start-up capital. And it wasn't as though he had inexpensive tastes. "Then I really can't arrest you for trespassing." 

"Never stopped Haven PD before." He waggled his bottle at her. "I'd offer you a celebratory toast, but you're a little far away." 

Audrey looked away, towards her car in the otherwise empty lot, then out over the water. She still wanted to be alone. But now that she'd found him, there was no way she could let Duke out of her sight. "Alright," she said finally. "I'll be right up." 

Up close, Duke looked like hell: washed out and unkempt, his clothes — what looked like parts of someone else's suit — torn and dirty. His eyes were red and swollen, and the smile he offered as she approached was wide and false. She sat down on the deck next to him, slipping her legs between the rails alongside his. 

"Never took you for a restaurant guy," she said. 

"To be fair, you've only known me as a hermit." Duke shrugged and offered her the bottle. Audrey took it and looked at the label. Rum. _Cheap_ rum. He definitely wasn't celebrating. "But you're right. A bar guy, maybe. But I couldn't let this place turn into a Lobster Pup." Audrey took a sip of the rum and grimaced. It burned, and not in the good way. Duke winced apologetically. "Sorry. My options were limited. Bill got all my cash." 

"You paid _cash_ for this place?" 

"Twenty bucks." 

"That was the 'better deal'?" 

"Bill couldn't let it be a Lobster Pup either." 

Audrey handed the bottle back, wiping her mouth on her sleeve. "You don't look like you're celebrating." 

Duke looked down at the water, bouncing his heels off the deck again. "Geoff was a friend." 

Audrey watched his throat work, the way the corner of his visible eye glistened. "You didn't know," she said. "When he died." 

His lips quirked upwards. It wasn't even close to a smile. "I kept up with them at first, after I moved out there." He took a long drink from his bottle. "Turns out it's actually easier to stay in touch from the other side of the world than it is from an island just out to sea." 

"Someone should have told you," Audrey said. 

Duke scowled at his hands. "Yeah." 

"Is that why you didn't go back?" Audrey asked. "You called Bill, and he told you what happened?" 

Duke turned to look at her finally, not saying a word, and she had her answer. This grief was fresh. He'd only learned about Geoff this morning. 

"Where have you been, Duke?" 

"Not killing people. If that's what you're asking." 

"No," Audrey agreed. "If someone was running around killing people, we would have noticed. If nothing else, there'd be a spike in missing persons reports." 

Duke raised his eyebrows, tilting his head towards her even as he stared back out at the water. "That's fair." 

"Why didn't you go back to the island?" 

"Can we go back to talking about Lucy instead?" he asked. Audrey twitched. Duke flashed her a smirk, which melted into a frown when he saw her expression. "Shit. Did something happen on the Lucy front?" 

Audrey gave him a measuring look. She didn't want to tell Duke first. She didn't want to tell anyone at all. It was all too strange. She wondered if this was how the troubled felt when they first found out. 

She didn't wonder if she was troubled, though. Somehow she was certain: she was something different. 

"If I tell you about Lucy," she said, giving Duke a measuring look. "Will you tell me where you've been since Dockside Green?" 

Duke looked down at his bottle, then climbed unsteadily to his feet. He swung one of the plywood boards lining the second floor aside, revealing an open door. "After you." 

Audrey gave him a look and squeezed through the gap. By the light coming in over her shoulder she could make out scattered tables and chairs, a few carts and crates, the remains of the old restaurant's interior. 

And a sleeping bag. 

"You've been living here?" 

"Only a couple of days." Audrey looked back at him and he shrugged. "What, should I have booked a B&B?" 

Audrey snorted, stepping out of the way for him to follow. He pulled the plywood back into place behind him, plunging them into darkness. Audrey was reminded sharply of Thornton Aarons' home. 

How long would Haven's troubled have to keep living in the dark? 

Duke switched on a small electric lantern and the moment passed. 

One of the tables was already set up, so they pulled up chairs, tucking in on either side like they were in an exclusive dafe. Duke pulled out a couple of glasses — actual glass tumblers, no more mismatched mugs for him — and set them on the table, pouring a finger into each from his bottle of rum. 

"To Geoff," he said, holding up his glass. Audrey lifted her own. 

"To Geoff. And second chances." 

Duke made a small noise, almost smothered in a cough, and downed his rum in a single go before pouring another. "He'd have gotten a kick out of this. Me squatting in his folks' old place." 

"You were close," Audrey said. She was feeling impatient, anxious to know where he'd been and what he'd been doing, even while she dreaded having to put her own news into words. Still, she knew grief wouldn't be hurried. He deserved to take a moment to honor his friend. 

"Bill and Geoff were like my brothers." He gave his glass that odd, non-smile again. "Way more than any of my actual brothers were. Geoff and I both swore once we got out of here, we'd never come back." He shook his head. "Guess that worked out real well for both of us, huh." 

"Why'd you come back?" 

Duke shrugged. "I promised my old man I would." 

"Didn't your dad die when you were eight?" 

"Yep." Duke leaned back in his chair, out of the range of the lantern. All Audrey could make out was the reflection of the lantern off his eyes and his broad, white teeth. "But contrary to what Nathan might tell you, I don't break my promises." His teeth vanished into the dark. She heard the creak as he shifted in his seat. "Even when I probably should." 

They sat in silence for a long moment, until he straightened abruptly, leaning back into the light. "Talking about my dad wasn't part of the deal. What did you find out about Lucy?" 

Audrey twisted her glass on the table. "It's weird." 

Duke huffed. "Audrey." 

"Even for Haven. And I feel a little bad telling you about it before I tell Nathan." 

Duke snorted. "Nathan's been disappointed in me for 30 years. You'll get used to it." 

Audrey laughed a little and kicked him in the ankle. Duke grinned back, broad and, for once, entirely real. She sipped her drink. "What would you say if I told you I _am_ Lucy?" 

Duke's smile froze, then drooped a little, his brows coming down. "Are you?" 

He'd wanted Lucy to adopt him, Audrey remembered. She tossed the rest of her drink back and refilled both their glasses. He watched her carefully, taking a long sip when she finished, his eyes never leaving her face. 

"Shit," he said. 

Audrey nodded. 

Duke sat back again, bringing his drink with him. They drank in silence. Audrey wished they had better light. 

"Vanessa told me how I die," Duke said, soft and distant into the dark. Audrey wrapped both hands around her glass. 

"How?" 

Duke smiled without humor. "Exactly how you'd expect. A troubled person kills me." He looked down into his drink and shrugged. "Only fair, really. I'll probably be trying to kill them right back. Only problem is, she couldn't tell me who. Or when. Just — a man's hand, grabbing me by the face. Then —" He made a cracking noise with his mouth and drew his thumb across his throat. 

Audrey shook her head. "Then how do you know he's troubled? Maybe you'll just . . . get mugged." 

"It's cute that you think that," Duke said. "But no. The arm in her vision had a Guard tattoo. You don't get one of those if you're not troubled." 

Audrey frowned. "Guard?" 

Duke nodded. "It's this local secret society or something of troubled people. They use this symbol, a circular maze thing with four little people on each of the compass points." Audrey couldn't keep her surprise off her face. Duke smiled coldly. "You've seen it. It's kind of everywhere, once you know what to look for." 

"What do they do?" Audrey asked. "The Guard?" 

Duke shook his head. "No idea. Something to do with the troubles. Guy who told me about them just said to keep clear. But I bet you the Chief knows. And so does Reverend Driscoll." 

Audrey felt a rush of cold. She let one hand drop to her side, checking instinctively that her gun was still in place, even as she kept her eyes on his. 

Duke shrugged, breaking eye contact to splash more rum into his glass. "Not that he's telling. Wouldn't say a damn thing about anything until I 'proved myself worthy'." He nodded towards her. "You can relax, Officer Parker. I'm as big a disappointment to him as everyone else." 

"So, what? You spent the last two weeks trying to get answers from the Rev?" 

Duke tilted his head. "Close. I spent about a week playing nice little acolyte out at some bible camp of his in the woods, realized it was basically another form of exile, and then spent the next three days trying to hitchhike my way back to civilization without ending up murdering anybody."

That explained his outfit, at least. 

"And then you called Bill." 

"And then I broke in here and hid until Bill found me this morning." 

"You didn't call for help?" 

Duke gave her a tired smirk. "Last time I did that, I ended up in a cult in the woods." 

Audrey frowned. Jack Driscoll was apparently a better liar than she'd thought. 

"So, Officer Parker." Duke straightened in his seat, pouring the last of the rum into her glass. "What's your plan? You going to ship me back out to Elba?" 

Audrey tilted her head. "Do you want me to?" 

Duke opened his mouth. Before he could answer, a tremor shook the building, rattling silverware and glasses all around them. The rum bottle fell from the table and smashed to the floor. The quake only lasted a few seconds, and as soon as it was done, Duke was on his feet, shoving the plywood out of the way as he rushed out the door. Audrey hurried after him, looking down at where her car tilted precariously in the gravel lot, its front end stuck in a crack in the ground. 

"Goddammit! I just got that car!" 

"Audrey," Duke said, flailing behind him for her arm. He wasn't looking at the lot, but out over the water. "The lighthouse. It's _gone_."

*

Duke walked into the police station like a man expecting to be attacked at any moment. Considering what he'd told Audrey about where he'd been the last couple weeks, she wasn't at all convinced it was an overreaction. She'd watched him sink further into himself the closer they'd gotten to the center of town — walking, since she hadn't been able to get her car backed out of that damn crack. She felt a pang to see it, much stronger than her usual sympathy for the troubled, and wondered just when the odd, not-quite-hermit had gotten so far under her skin.

If Garland noticed Duke's discomfort, though, he didn't let on. He waved Duke into his office, making a face when Audrey slipped in as well before he could close the door. 

"Parker," he said. He didn't normally smoke in the station, but there was a pack sitting out on his desk, and an unlit cigarette dangling from his lip. "Think Nathan could use you on this lighthouse thing." 

"No offense, Chief," Audrey said. "But I'm not letting Duke out of my sight." 

"She's not," Duke agreed with a tiny shrug. "Sasquatch would be proud." 

Garland looked them both over, flipping his lighter open and shut, then nodded. He took the unlit cigarette from his mouth and tapped it butt-first against his desk as he sat down. "Got someone I need Duke to take care of." 

Audrey suppressed a shudder. "The crack trouble?" 

Garland let out a tiny laugh, rubbing his forehead. His hair stuck out in every direction, like he'd been fisting his hands in it. 

Duke shot Audrey a worried look. "I'm not doing that again, Chief," he said slowly. "We've been over this." 

"You will this time," Garland said. "When I tell you — if you ever really cared about Nathan, you'll do it." 

Audrey took a careful step forwards, watching the tension in Garland's shoulders, the way his hands shook. "Chief —" 

"I'd do it myself — probably almost have a coupla times now — but it won't be the same. If a man's gotta die it ought to _count_." 

He was talking about himself. Audrey was sure of it. Garland had never shown any signs of sharing Nathan's affliction, but Audrey knew an out of control trouble when she saw one. 

"The cracks," she said. "In the roads. Out on Carpenter's Knot. Jack Driscoll's boat." 

"The _Cape Rouge_," Duke said, something low and unnameable in his tone. 

Garland nodded. "You don't know what it's like, trying to hold it all together." He stuck his cigarette back in his mouth, but his hands shook too hard to keep his lighter lit. "Should get Nathan in here for this. Always meant to tell him." He looked at Duke. "He'd never forgive me for telling you first. Or for telling him in front of you." 

"I can go," Duke offered, already backing towards the door. "That's fine." 

"Max Hansen," Garland said. Duke stopped. "You find him, you take him out. You hear me?" 

Duke shook his head. "That guy who killed that family twenty years ago? He's in prison. The hell does he have to do with Nathan?" 

Garland looked at Audrey again, like she should have all the answers. The only answer she had was that Garland didn't share Nathan's trouble. She'd never heard of Max Hansen, had no idea why Garland would want him taken out. Why he'd want Duke in particular to do it. 

For Nathan. 

_Oh._

"Parker gets it," Garland said. "Of course you do. You work out any of the rest of it yet?" Audrey didn't know what her face did, but he saw something in it and nodded. "Been waiting for you. Trying to hold everything together 'til you got here. Took your damn sweet time this time, didn't you." He shot a look at Duke. "You boys haven't made it easy on me." 

Duke laughed without humor and shook his head. "No way, old man. You don't get to put any of this on me. Or Nathan." 

"Nathan," Garland said. He pitched his cigarette into the trash and got shakily to his feet. "Should talk to him too. You get out of here, Duke. You — you take out Max Hansen and you'll be done, alright? We'll be done." He wobbled his way out the door before Audrey could stop him. Duke watched him go, then whirled on Audrey. 

"What the hell did that mean?" 

Audrey swallowed. There was something thick and cloying in her throat. She wanted to chase after Garland, go grab Nathan before they could talk. Before Garland could tell Nathan what Audrey hoped she'd gotten wrong. What she knew was absolutely true. The same way knew that she'd been Lucy. The same way she knew how to soothe the troubled. 

"Audrey?" Duke asked. His face was so open now. Pleading with her to make it all better. 

He'd wanted Lucy to be his mom. 

"Duke," she said. "I think Max Hansen has Nathan's trouble." Duke's eyes went wide. "I think he might be Nathan's real father."

*

"No." Duke didn't do anything quite so obvious as _bolt_, but Audrey still had to jog to keep up with him as he left the station. "I'm not doing it, Audrey. Don't you dare ask me to."

"I'm not." Audrey ran down the steps as Duke strode across the street. She wondered where he thought he'd go without a car. The police station was central in Haven; they were surrounded on all sides by people. By troubles. "Hey! Stop, Duke! I haven't asked you to do anything!" 

Duke stopped on the sidewalk across from the station, anger written large on his face. Audrey could still see through it, though. Duke wasn't so much pissed as scared. 

He was going to do it. Audrey was suddenly certain of that. If Duke found Max Hansen, he would kill him to save Nathan from his trouble. Even if he lost himself doing it. 

And that terrified him. 

Oh, these poor _idiot_ boys. 

"You will," Duke said, voice resigned. Empty. "Everyone does." He looked past her, up at the station doors, and seemed to shrink again, shoulders rounding into a protective crouch. Audrey didn't have to look to know who'd just come out, but she did anyway, hoping she might be wrong. 

She wasn't. 

"Duke!" Nathan barked. He had to look down to navigate the steep stairs with any kind of speed, and Duke nearly escaped while he did. Likely would have — Audrey wouldn't have stopped him, not this time — if the ground didn't shake, a crack opening in the sidewalk in front of him. Car alarms went off all the way down the street. Under their blare, Audrey heard someone scream. 

Garland's talk with Nathan must not have gone well. 

"Duke." Nathan barely glanced at the crack, ignored the scream. He grabbed for Duke's arm before he could pull away. 

"Relax, Nathan," Duke sneered. "I'm not going to kill anyone. No matter what the Chief says." 

Nathan swallowed. This close, Audrey could see the sheen in his eyes, tears threatening to spill over. She wondered if he even knew they were there. "What if I want you to?" 

Duke wrenched his arm away, but held his ground, staring Nathan down from inches away just like he had at Dockside Green. The two of them couldn't help but crowd into each other's space. Audrey wondered again what their relationship had really been like, before that fateful fight. She held her breath, wondering which of them would break first. 

As though either of them weren't already broken. 

Finally, after a small eternity, Duke looked away. His eyes found Audrey instead, and he flicked her a tiny, sad smile. 

"You see?" he said. "Everyone always does." 

And he turned, jumping easily over the crack, and walked away. Nathan tried to follow, but misjudged the crack's edge and went down, sprawling across the concrete. Audrey crouched automatically to help, but he shook her off. 

"Go get him," he said. Ordered. Pleaded. "I'm fine. _Go get him._" 

Audrey nodded. "We're talking later." Nathan growled. Duke turned the corner at the end of the block, and with one last glance at her partner — her best friend — sprawled on the ground, Audrey followed. 

Duke's long legs ate ground without him trying, and though she hadn't been far behind him, he'd already managed to get quite the lead. It was a quiet day at least, few people out and about, nowhere for Duke to lose himself in a crowd. 

Everyone was probably hunkering in place by now. As the Chief's nerves frayed, the cracks would only get worse.

"Leave me alone, Audrey." Duke didn't look back at her, just kept moving forward. Audrey had to all but jog to keep up. 

"Why?" she asked. "So you can go back to hiding out at the Second Chance? Or maybe finally hitch a ride back to your island? Because I don't think you want to do either." 

"No shit." Duke slowed a little, ducking his head and pulling his arms in close to his body as he rounded another corner and nearly ran over a woman coming the other way with her eyes on her phone. The woman gave him the stink-eye. Audrey flashed her a quick smile of apology even as she used the moment to finally catch up with Duke. "Actually," he said, picking up his pace again. "I'm thinking Bali sounds nice. But having a cop on my ass is going to make it real hard to steal a boat." 

"You know, I could take you in just for saying that." 

Duke snorted. "You could, but it'd be a dick move." 

"Seriously, Duke." Audrey grabbed his arm, pulling him around to face her. "What do _you_ want to do?" 

He covered it quickly, but Audrey still spotted the shock that flickered across his face at the question. She wondered when anyone had last asked him that. She suspected it'd been awhile. 

"I want to go back three years and get my life back." He wore his pain in his voice rather than his body, Audrey realized. When something really hurt, he went hoarse. "Can you do that for me, Audrey?" 

She smiled sadly. "If I could, don't you think I would have done it already?" 

Duke dropped his head, looking almost sorry. "How do you do it?" Audrey shook her head and he continued, voice still low, but now full of a sort of exhausted hope. "You just had your entire identity — your whole _life_ — turned on its head, and you're still —" He cut himself off, running his hand through his hair. "How do you do it?" 

Audrey shrugged flippantly, wanting to put some energy back into his tone. "Well, my boss is tearing the town apart, I'm pretty sure my partner just found out at 35 that he's adopted, and my friend," she tilted her head, giving him a smirk, "seems to be having some kind of crisis of his own. So I haven't really had time to freak out about it yet." 

Duke looked away. "You don't have to take care of me, Audrey. I've been doing that for myself for a long time." 

"Since Lucy left." 

Duke grimaced, twisting away, only to freeze at the sound of brakes squealing. A van rounded the corner, long and white and nondescript. Duke froze. "Audrey. _Run._" 

There was no time. The van screeched to a stop, bouncing up over the curb and forcing them back against the building behind them. She heard Nathan shout from the top of the street and break into a run. The van's double side doors wrenched open, and a man aimed a rifle into Audrey's face. 

"Mr. Crocker," an oily voice said from within. "Get into the van, please. You too, Ms. Parker." The Reverend Driscoll leaned into the light, eyes intent and self-satisfied. "We have business to discuss."

*

Audrey had found herself in a variety of dangerous, strange, and/or embarrassing situations over the course of her career. Being locked up with her own handcuffs had to be about the most infuriating and humiliating. Especially when they didn't bother to handcuff or tie Duke up at all, just kept that gun aimed at Audrey's face and watched him cooperate. 

"You realize you just abducted a police officer a block away from the station, right?" Audrey asked, refusing to show the Rev or his men that she was at all disconcerted or intimidated. She had a spare key to her cuffs in her shoe; she just had to find the right opportunity to reach for it. "Detective Wuornos was _right there_. You're not going to make it more than a mile before every cop in Haven is on your ass." 

The Rev smiled. "Nathan Wuornos has other things to be concerned with just now, Ms. Parker. And I have no fear of the Haven police." 

Duke had his own poker face locked in place, but Audrey didn't miss the way he twitched at the implied threat to Nathan. "You going to actually tell us what you're after here, Rev? Or are we supposed to guess?" 

"In due time, my boy." The Rev patted Duke on the knee. Duke twitched his leg away. "Perhaps this evening you should pray for patience." 

Audrey shivered at his possessive tone, even as Duke's expression shut down further. 

"Thought I made it pretty clear I want no part in your congregation, Rev." 

The Rev's smug expression never faltered. "You've been misled, son. Made to believe your heritage is a curse. If your father had survived —" 

"If my father had survived, he'd still be a dick." Duke grabbed onto the seat next to him as the van hit a pothole. Audrey, only able to brace with her legs, wobbled in her seat like a bobblehead. The barrel of the rifle the Rev's man held on her came terrifyingly close to her eye. She refused to flinch. 

"I don't care what my father believed," Duke continued. "I'm not your holy soldier, Rev. I'm never going to be."

"We'll see," the Rev said, unruffled. "We'll see." 

The road got rougher, significantly so. Audrey's spine ached from trying not to bounce right off her seat. She watched the rifleman out of the corner of her eye, wondering if she could use the rough ride to her advantage and disarm him. "And me?" she asked, holding up her cuffed hands. "You said we had things to discuss. Or am I just here to make Duke play nice?" 

"Audrey," Duke hissed. Audrey ignored him as she stared down the Rev. 

"I have no plans to hurt you, Ms. Parker," the Rev said. "That's not my role. Just as it was not for me to intervene when you were Lucy." He smiled, slow and sick as he watched her face. "So you knew." He looked at Duke. "Both of you. That's good. You'll understand then when I tell you that this battle has spanned generations." 

"What _battle?_" Duke asked. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"The battle for Haven's very soul," the Rev said, eyes bright and, Audrey thought, not at all sane. 

The van bumped to a stop. "Ah," the Rev said. "We're here." 

'Here' was a small clearing in the woods in front of a large wooden shed. Several more men and women stood in front of the shed, heavily armed with hunting rifles and shotguns. The rifleman in the van urged Audrey out, the Rev pushing Duke along behind. Audrey noted gas cans and tinder stacked against the side of the shed and narrowed her eyes. 

She'd seen this before. Not up close, thankfully, but she'd gone up against cults before in her time in the FBI, militias too. There were always casualties. 

This wouldn't end well. 

Duke seemed to come to the same conclusion. He stared around the clearing, looking increasingly perturbed. "What the hell is going on here, Rev?"

"We're here for you, son." The Rev smiled at him, close-lipped and smug. "It's time for you to take your rightful place." He nodded to one of his acolytes by the shed, who opened the door. Audrey sucked in a breath when she saw inside. 

People. At least a dozen of them. Lying bound and unconscious. 

"Audrey," Duke breathed, reaching for her, only to be urged away by a woman holding a shotgun. "I thought you said you'd _notice_ if people were going missing!" 

Audrey shook her head. "We would. They must have — in all the chaos today with the cracks. . . ."

"You've seen it, Duke. Haven is literally falling apart." The Rev grabbed Duke by the wrist, hanging on tight when Duke tried to pull away. He pressed a hunting knife into Duke's palm. "It's up to you to save it." 

"_No._" Duke jerked out of the Rev's grip, shoving him away and brandishing the knife to keep him back. "I'm not going to kill for you!" 

"Why are you fighting this?" the man holding the rifle on Audrey asked. "You've done it before, Crocker. We all know what you can do!" 

Duke's expression crumpled at the edges, desperation and despair showing under his mask of anger. "That's not the same thing!" 

"Angie Benton," Audrey said, loathe to draw their attention, but needing Duke to know he wasn't the lone objector. "She had a cannibalism trouble. What Duke did saved lives." She stared at Duke, willing him to look at her. He did in small bursts, eyes flicking back and forth over the Rev's men in between. 

"Ms. Benton was a brave and righteous soul," the Rev said. "She had strayed from her path, but chose to ask forgiveness. In doing so, she kept her nieces from sharing her fate." Duke turned, knife still held out defensively. The Rev held his ground, that damned smirk still on his face. "She was one of my flock, Duke. I'm the one who told her of your gift. Who directed her to Garland Wuornos so she might find salvation." He held his arms open, full of pride and righteous fury. "She was the first you saved. She will be one of _many_." 

Audrey felt ill. She twisted her hands in her cuffs, itching for her gun, for any weapon she could use to turn the tide here. There were too many people, too many chances for someone to get hurt or killed, and her spare keys were too far away. "You kidnapped those people," she said. All she could do was keep the conversation going, keep the Rev pontificating as long as possible. Buy time for the cavalry to arrive. Nathan was right behind them; whatever the Rev had managed to throw at him, he _would_ come. Not just for her sake, but for Duke's as well. "Those gas cans. You want to, what, burn them? All because of something they never chose, something they were born with!" 

Duke nodded, knuckles white around the knife, and moved slowly towards her. "Audrey's right." His voice was thick but steady. "It was Angie's _choice_ to die. None of these people has chosen anything." 

The Rev sighed, his smile finally fading. "You disappoint me, Duke, but I'm not surprised. From the moment she met you on the docks all those years ago, I knew this day would come." He was building up another head of steam, all fire and brimstone. "She's planned this for decades, son. That woman is the daughter of the devil himself!" 

It was nonsense of course. Just the Rev's usual liturgical hot air. He saw Goody Proctor dancing with demons in the pale moonlight. But still, some part of Audrey wondered if it could be true. Everything about her had come into question today. She'd been Lucy, but she'd had no idea, no memory of it. Who else could she have been over the years? Who else might she become? 

Who was she to say who — or _what_ — she really was? 

"She's my friend," Duke said, and he sounded so certain. Audrey grabbed hold of the words and hung on for dear life. 

"She murdered your father," the Rev said, and Audrey went cold. 

Duke shook his head, glaring at the Rev. "Dad died at sea." 

"Don't be so naive, boy. How else could she have known to meet you that night? She stole you from us then. Your whole life could have been different, if not for _her_." 

Duke swallowed, the hand holding the knife dropping to his side. "I don't know," he said softly. He turned to look back at Audrey again. "There's a lot neither of knows." She bit her lip, feeling a sting in her eyes. What the Rev was saying made _sense_ in a strange, terrifying way, but Duke was resolute. He believed in her, even though she wasn't sure she could believe in herself. "All Audrey's been trying to do is help people." He turned back to the Rev. "All you're doing is hurting them." 

The Rev narrowed his eyes and lifted his chin. "You've made your decision then." 

"Yes!" Duke dropped the knife and held out his hands. "Of _course_ I have, you ass, I told you that already!" 

The Rev closed his eyes and bowed his head. "Very well." Audrey braced herself, not believing for a moment it could be that easy. The Rev looked up, a newly manic gleam in his eye, and looked past them to the shed. He nodded. 

The sharp smell of accelerant hit Audrey's nose. Two pairs of hands roughly grabbed her by the upper arms, and a second rifle took took aim at her face. The Rev reached down and picked up the knife again, offering it to Duke. 

"Either Audrey Parker or the thirteen troubled people in that shed will die here today by your hand. Or we will kill them all."


	9. Interlude

Angie Benton came to Garland's office on a rainy Monday morning in March. She was pale and shivering, but given the weather, Garland didn't worry too much about that until she sat down in the chair across from him and said in a flat, airy voice that she needed him to kill her. 

"I'm sorry, ma'am," he said, leaning back in his chair. "That's not really what we do here." 

"You don't remember me, do you." She smiled, small and wan. "My name is Angela Benton. I was just a kid last time we met." 

Garland shook his head. The name rang a bell, but he couldn't place it yet. Not until she dropped her hands into her lap and hung her head, her dark hair falling in her face. He remembered then, alright. Remembered all too well. The bodies particularly. He'd grown up in this town, had spent his life hunting in these woods, had seen more than once what a hungry animal could do to a person. 

He'd never seen anything like what Angie's father had done. 

"You and your brother," he said, folding his own hands on his desk and trying not to think about the tremble in his chest. "We found you out in that cabin off Route 202." It had been days before the Hunter. Angie had sat just like that, her brother tucked into her side, while a team of local hunters caught and murdered her troubled father. Garland remembered watching them carefully while Lucy broke the news to the kids, so gentle but firm, trying so hard to keep their own troubles from activating at the trauma. Remembered hating Lucy just a little, hating himself even more for having already ended Simon Crocker. The only one who could guarantee that those kids would never hunger for human flesh. 

There'd been a moment, just one fleeting, inexcusable moment, when he'd wondered if the Crocker trouble was strong enough to allow Simon's eight year old son to take down a grown man. 

He needed a cigarette. Then and now. 

"My little brother," Angie agreed. Her hands curled into claws in her lap. Garland found himself glad that nicotine was all he was craving. "Nick. He died last week. A car accident in Derry." 

That would do it, if it were sudden and bloody enough. Garland remembered how tightly those two had held onto each other. 

"I'm sorry for your loss," Garland said. "But I'm afraid I'm still not sure what you want from me here." 

The lie came easier than breathing. Easy as the first puff of the morning, before he woke up fully and remembered the mess that his life had become. 

Angie took a deep breath through clenched teeth, and let it out in a faint growl. "You know what my father was. You know how these — _things_ work." 

Garland sighed. "The troubles, yeah. I know they aren't easy. I know you gotta fight like hell to keep 'em down." He gave her a stern look and tried to channel his inner Lucy. "I also know they can be beat. You, your brother, you were okay last time. You can be okay again." 

Angie started shaking her head before he got halfway through that little speech, and likely wasn't hearing a word of it by the end. Garland couldn't blame her a bit. He made a horrible Lucy. 

Just ask Duke. 

"_Please_," she said, sounding like she had to fight tooth and nail to get it out. "I know about Duke Crocker. I know he can break this curse. And I know you know where he's hiding." 

Garland bit down on his cheek. "And how'd you find that out?" 

Her hand came up to her neck, fingering a little gold cross at her throat. Her fingernails were dirty, their beds full of old blood. "I ate my neighbor's cat this morning. All I could think was — _it's not enough_." 

"Now, I'm sorry to hear that too," Garland said, suppressing a shudder. He wondered how many other lost pets the woman in front of him could be responsible for. Better pets than people, though. "Duke Crocker is not an option. Not for your daddy, and not for you. I'm afraid we can't help you, Ms. Benton." 

She lunged across the desk, too fast for Garland to see, much less avoid. She wrapped her hands in the front of his shirt and yanked him forward, burying her nose in his hair and taking a good, long _sniff_. Garland forced himself not to cry out. The last thing he needed was Nathan barging in here. The fool boy still though the troubles were a myth, thought his own was only some strange illness. He wouldn't stand a chance against a feral trouble like this one. 

"Let me go, Ms. Benton," he said instead, keeping his tone stern and even. She listened, thank Christ, dropping him and darting back with a sob. "I'm not interested in letting you commit suicide by cop, neither." 

Angie dropped back into her chair, shuddering, her knuckles pressed into her mouth. Her eyes rolled like a horse in distress. Garland watched as she pulled her humanity back over herself like a shroud. 

"I have —" she said, voice jerking, "— another — brother." She spit out her hand, having bitten furrows in her fingers. "Older. Already grown when Dad —" She closed her eyes, panting, and groaned. "He has kids." 

Fuck. 

"_Please._" 

Garland nodded slowly. "I'll make some calls." He stood, wanting to delay the moment of truth as long as possible, but knowing his hesitation was already driving the young woman across from him mad. "There anything else we can get you in the meantime? Maybe take the edge off a little?" 

Angie sat twitching in her seat and shook her head. Garland hurried out of the office, locking the door behind him. 

He had to play this carefully. Duke's whereabouts were a closely guarded secret only he and the Teagues and a few trusted Guard members knew the full truth of. And Dwight. He hadn't been Guard in a little while now, working full time for Garland instead. If anyone could help wrangle the Benton trouble, it was him. Garland wasn't thrilled with the idea of bringing more troubled people to Duke's island than absolutely necessary, especially when he was likely about to deliberately set off the Crocker bloodlust in the boy, but he couldn't do this alone. 

And if things went bad enough, and Duke had to be put down, then having a trained soldier by his side couldn't help but be to his advantage. 

Dwight agreed, though he had misgivings. "Are you sure Crocker will be willing to do it?" he asked. "I've gotten to know the guy pretty well. I'm not sure he's got it in him. Hell, he locked himself in a closet and almost bled out rather than let his trouble take him." 

Garland gave him a sharp look. "You think that's wise, getting chummy with him like that?" 

Dwight gave Garland a withering one right back. "I think it's important that someone around here remembers he's a person, not just a trouble." 

Garland felt a jolt of shame at that and didn't reply. 

The boat ride out was long and awkward. Angie sat curled against the gunwale, a broad brimmed hat pulled down low over her eyes; Dwight by her side in stony silence. Duke met them at the dock, bundled into a thick coat, squinting against the wind and the rain.

"Hell of a day you picked for a visit, Chief, 'Squatch." Duke nodded to them both, tilting his head to frown at Angie. "Who's your friend?" 

Angie looked up and smiled so wide and manic at Duke that he rocked back a step. 

"This is Angie," Garland said. Duke backed up further, shooting Garland a hard look laced with betrayal before he could even finish talking. "She's got a trouble needs taking care of." 

"Are you _kidding me?_" Duke hissed. He turned, storming off up the stairs. As though, if he stomped hard enough, no one would know he was running away. 

"_No,_" Angie wailed. She scrambled off the boat and up the dock after him. Dwight grabbed his duffel off the deck at his feet and slung it over his shoulder before following, Garland hot on his heels. 

"You got your crossbow?" he asked, keeping his voice pitched low under Angie's pleas and Duke's denials. Dwight nodded once, but pulled something else off his belt, small and snub-nosed. "You think a taser's going to be enough to take down _either_ of them, they get going?!" 

"Got a tranq gun too. Dosed high enough to take down a bear. Lethal force is a last resort." Dwight raised an eyebrow at him. "You going to trust me or not, Chief?" 

Garland scowled, but waved him on. 

Duke's flight stopped once he reached the field where his cabin sat, though he made sure to keep his distance from Angie. Angie herself was moving stiffly now, her hands over her stomach, her breath panting through her teeth. She was on the very edge of her control. Dwight held the taser low and ready. 

"Please," Angie said, almost more of a groan than a word. "You _have_ to." 

Duke shook his head, looking past her to Garland. "You can't want this, Chief. The whole point of me living here is so I _don't_ kill people!" 

"I'm sorry, son." Garland held his gaze. The least he could do now was show the boy some respect. "I've seen her trouble in action. She'll go feral." 

"And I won't?!" Duke turned to Dwight. "Sasquatch. You know this isn't right." 

Dwight's jaw tightened. "This is what your curse is for, Duke." 

Angie groaned, dropping to her knees in the grass, her hands pressed to her stomach. Duke hopped back, looking at her like she might go off at any moment. 

"She's a cannibal, Duke," Garland said. "She can't help it. Her trouble has to be stopped." 

Duke opened his mouth to protest again, but Angie spoke first. 

"Frankie," she said softly. Her head was lowered, but by the way Duke stared at her now, Garland suspected he was getting that pleading through her lashes treatment. "Amelia. Sophie." 

"Don't," Duke started. 

"Sophie's nine," Angie said. She swayed on her knees. "But troubles don't care." 

"She can't save them from this, Duke," Dwight said, voice low. "You can." His own girl would have been Sophie's age, Garland realized. If she were still alive, would Dwight be asking for the same thing Angie was? 

If Nathan were Garland's biological son, would he? 

Duke fisted his hands by his sides, falling back another few steps. "No." 

Angie pounced. 

She hit him low around the waist, an inhuman snarl in her throat. Duke went down, hands already out to keep her back. They tumbled together down the hill toward the trees. Dwight raised his taser, looking for a clear shot. Garland grabbed his arm. 

"Hang on now," he said. "She's forcing the issue."

"We took all of Duke's weapons," Dwight said. "She has the advantage." He shoved his duffle at Garland and moved forward, keeping the taser aimed. "Get the tranq gun ready." 

Some gall, trying to give Garland orders. Still, Garland dug into the bag. 

Angie growled. Duke cried out. There was a sound of tearing flesh. Garland pulled out the crossbow as well. 

Then Angie flew backwards into the clearing, blood pouring down her jaw and arm. She'd bitten clear through her own wrist. Duke stalked out after her, silver-eyed, wearing a snarl of his own. 

"Jesus," Garland muttered. He hadn't actually seen it since that first night on the docks. He'd forgotten just how alien Duke looked like that. How inhuman. 

Dwight lowered the taser, though he stayed braced for action, placing himself between Garland and the two of them. Garland lifted the crossbow, though there didn't seem to be much fight left to worry about. 

Angie grinned up at Duke, her own blood staining her teeth. Duke loomed over her, his hands shaking under the full force of his curse. 

"You're sure?" he asked. Garland was honestly surprised to hear coherent words out of him. 

Angie nodded, closing her eyes. "Thank you." 

Duke crouched, cupping her jaw with one hand, impossibly gentle considering he could only be absorbing more blood by doing it. The other hand he put on her shoulder. He kept his eyes locked on her face as he jerked his arms, neatly snapping her neck. 

The clearing went silent, but for the patter of rain and the gentle roar of the surf. Duke slowly let Angie go, shifting back to sit on his heels. Dwight tucked the taser away, though Garland didn't lower the crossbow again until Duke looked up, his eyes brown and inscrutable. 

"You did good, son," Garland said. 

"Fuck you, Chief," said Duke. He looked back down at Angie. "I did that for her. Not you." 

Garland nodded. The reasons didn't much matter to him. "Just so —"

Duke stood, cutting him off with a wave of his hand. "Leave." 

Dwight slowly moved forward, hand out, like he was approaching a wild animal. "Let me take care of her." 

Duke looked at him, then down to Angie's body, then away towards the woods. He nodded. After a moment, he reached down, scooping up Angie's discarded hat, crumpling the brim in his hands. 

"Take her and go," he said, starting towards the cabin. He paused on the porch without looking back. "Just so you know, Dwight? Curses aren't _for_ anything. They just — _suck_." 

He went into the cabin and slammed the door behind him.


	10. Phoenix

Duke stared at the knife, his throat working. As though he was actually trying to decide. As though the Rev had made it far enough under Duke's skin that this ridiculous plan made some kind of sense. 

"Really?!" Audrey said, because if Duke wasn't going to reject the whole premise of that 'choice', someone had to. "Stab one person, or burn thirteen alive. Or both! You're supposed to be a man of _God_, Driscoll. Whatever happened to 'thou shalt not kill'?"

She heard a murmur run through the Rev's people and lifted her chin. The Rev's control wasn't absolute. They hadn't all drunk the kool-aid yet. There was still a chance to deescalate this. 

"_Silence!_" the Rev barked, and the murmur stopped abruptly. "What we do here today is God's own will!" He looked back at Duke, thrustring the knife at him hilt-first. "You are not like the others, Duke. You know that in your heart. Your 'trouble' is dispassionate. Controllable. A gift from God himself, where theirs are remnants of pacts made with the devil." 

Duke frowned and reached out. Audrey's stomach dropped into her shoes. 

He took the knife. 

An engine roared through the trees. 

The Rev's followers shouted and scattered as the Bronco burst into the clearing, stopping just short of plowing into the shed. Audrey dropped, seizing the opportunity to go for her spare handcuff key. She looked up the moment she was free to see Duke smashing the butt-end of the knife into the Rev's temple, and felt a rush of relief. He hadn't been drinking the kool-aid either. 

Nathan sprang from the Bronco with his gun drawn, ordering everyone present to drop their weapons. The rifleman who'd been guarding Audrey tackled Duke from the side. Audrey yanked the shotgun from one of the other followers and took aim as Duke and the rifleman rolled across the ground. Duke pulled free and scrabbled back on all fours, eyes wide, knife still clenched in his fist. There was blood on the blade, and blood on Duke's hand. The rifleman must have been cut in the tussle, though it didn't look serious. 

Duke's hand shook as he held it up and stared at it. The entire clearing seemed to hold its breath. The blood vanished into Duke's skin. 

"Kyle," someone said, voice full of betrayal. "You're one of _them!_" 

"No!" The rifleman scrambled to his feet, hand clenched around a wound on his arm. "No, it's — it's a trick. It has to be!"

The Rev's followers cleared a wide berth around him. Duke got to his feet, a slow, controlled motion, every muscle in his body tensed. Audrey couldn't tear her eyes off of him. 

Off his eyes, so striking they could be seen clearly from yards away. 

"Duke," Nathan said, voice shaking. "Drop the knife." He had his gun aimed at Duke now, as though he was the imminent threat, instead of the crowd of armed fanatics. 

Audrey didn't think Duke looked like a threat at all. Dangerous, yes, no doubt about it. But this wasn't the wild psychosis everyone, even Duke, had made it out to be. This was _contained_. 

The Rev was right, not about much but about this, at least. Duke's trouble could be controlled. Not by Driscoll, not by Garland. Not by an empty, lonely island. By Duke himself. 

Duke took a measured breath. He held up his free hand, glancing back at Nathan. "Hang on," he said, his voice tight. Like he was holding back something heavy. 

"Take it back," Kyle cried. "I'm _not_ troubled. Take it _back!_" 

"Drop the knife, Duke!" Nathan swung his gun between Duke and Kyle, leaving Audrey to cover the rest of the crowd. She really hoped he'd brought back up. 

"It's alright, Kyle," the Rev said, sitting up slowly and rubbing his head. It was probably too much to hope that Duke's blow had brought him to his senses. "You may have strayed, but you know the path back to righteousness." 

Duke swung the knife towards him, his movements looser, his eyes fading back to their usual brown. The effect of the blood didn't last very long, then. "Shut _up_, Rev!" 

"Think of your wife, boy," the Rev said, ignoring Duke. "Didn't you say she was with child?" 

Kyle stared at Duke, his eyes wide. "I'm _not_ troubled," he said again, weakly this time. "I — I can't be." 

"Hey." Duke flipped the knife in his grip, aiming it at the sky. "Look, it's not the end of the world, alright? We don't even know what your trouble is. Maybe you just — turn things purple or something. It doesn't have to be bad, okay?" 

"That's right," Audrey said, stepping in before the Rev could spout any more of his poison. She could hear sirens now. Nathan had called for back-up, he just hadn't waited for it to get here before taking action. "There are plenty of people who just live with their troubles. Who never hurt anyone." 

Kyle frowned, but met her gaze hopefully. "L-like who?" 

"Like me." Nathan raised his hand. "You know me, Kyle. You know who my father is. You know we help people. We don't hurt them." 

Duke rolled his eyes a little at that, but thankfully kept his mouth shut. 

"I don't want to die," Kyle said. 

"That works out well then," said Duke. "Because I really don't want to kill you." He glared down at the Rev, who was staring back with a small small, knowing smirk. "I don't want to kill _anyone_." 

The sirens came closer, filling the clearing. Uniformed officers soon swarmed the scene. Nathan himself took the honor of handcuffing the Rev, who seemed to be taking his fifth amendment rights seriously, even as he kept staring at Duke with that manic gleam. Audrey was just going to check on the hostages in the shed when she heard someone moan behind her. 

"Mrs. West," one of the uniforms said. Audrey turned to see her maneuvering a middle aged woman in cuffs as the woman rolled her eyes and groaned. She looked familiar, somehow. "Mrs. West, are you alright?" 

"No," the woman said. "No, this is wrong. They destroyed my boy, they must be _punished!_" 

Mrs. West. _Matt West._ The firebug. 

Audrey had just long enough to register a flicker of heat and the scent of smoke before the shed exploded.

*

The world fractured into moments.

Smoke and heat. 

Her aching head. 

Muffled screams and an endless, high pitched wail.

*

Her nose hurt. Her chest. Her _lungs_.

Flickering, hot light. Someone calling a name. 

Her name. 

. . . What was her name?

*

_"Lucy."_

_"Garland. I'm sorry."_

_"Lucy, don't. I — please. I can't do this. I can't take care of _one_ of them, much less both —"_

_"You have to. For me. Please. He's just a little boy."_

_"Lucy. Lucy!"_

*

She breathed in hot, gritty air. Something pressed down on top of her, squashing her lungs. Her head, her chest, her arms, her _face_ —

Everything hurt. 

What kind of scars would she pass along to the next one?

*

_"Sarah."_

_"I have to."_

_"Sarah, please. Don't!"_

*

Someone was calling her name.

*

The light flickered, red and white and gold. Red was blood. White was eyes. Gold was —

Gold was. 

"I see her! Nathan, give me a hand!" 

Something shifted. Something else groaned. The first something shifted back. 

"Can't do it. Need more —" 

"I can." 

The something shifted again, faster this time. The groan turned into a shriek and light — _real_ light — flooded in. 

Gold was hair. Her hair. Not red. Not brown. 

"Audrey." 

She looked up, blinking in the glare, and saw two boys, soot-covered and sweating. One blue-eyed, the other silver. She smiled. "There you are. All grown up." 

Nathan frowned. Duke shrugged, breathing hard. 

"Either bleed on me again or hurry up, buddy. I can't hold this thing up forever."

*

They went home to Nathan's, all three of them. After the hospital, after all the paperwork that came with arresting more than twenty people, including the town preacher. It was nearly 3 AM by the time they got there, Nathan coming around to help Audrey down from the Bronco and leaving Duke to tumble out all on his own.

Fifteen people had been hospitalized thanks to the explosion. The shed had been remarkably sturdy, only partially collapsed, and the fire had somehow never spread to the surrounding trees. Audrey had been knocked out and pinned, but not badly burned. She'd been, the doctors had told her, extremely lucky. 

They all had. Fifteen hospitalized, more than that injured, and only one death. Audrey didn't ask who, just took in the way Duke carried himself, smaller and heavier than before. The way Nathan avoided looking at him. 

"Make yourselves comfortable," Nathan said, all but carrying Audrey to the couch, though she could get by just fine on her own. "I'll set up the guestroom." 

He hurried out, not even bothering to glare at Duke suspiciously as he went. Duke watched him go, then limped into the kitchen as though he knew the place. As though he'd belonged here, once upon a time. 

Audrey tilted her head back on the couch and closed her eyes, feeling the length of the day weigh on her bones. They could deal with themselves for once. She let herself drift. 

Something thick and warm was draped gently across her, a light, soothing pressure. A hand smoothed her hair from her face. She wondered if this was what it was like to have a mom. 

She woke a bit later to voices, speaking low a little ways away. 

"Why didn't you tell me?" Nathan asked. 

"I didn't know." 

"Not about the Chief." Silence. "You had a phone, Duke." 

More silence, long enough that Audrey thought maybe she'd nodded off again. 

"So?" Duke said finally. He had that empty quality in his voice again. Like he'd become just like his island: deserted. 

"I thought you'd left." Nathan's voice broke just a little. Audrey curled tighter under her blanket. They went quiet, even their breath. They didn't want to wake her. Or they didn't want her to overhear. 

She settled, letting herself drift again. If she fell asleep, they'd have their privacy. If she didn't. . . .

She'd never hold what they said against them. They were her boys. Her stubborn, ridiculous, troubled boys. And she thought maybe they had been for longer than she could remember. Duke had definitely been Lucy's. Why not Nathan as well? 

"I thought you'd left," Nathan said again, softer this time.

"And you threw a party," Duke said, then after a pause, at something Nathan did, some microexpression he thought he could replace words: "Don't give me that. You were pissed. I'd never seen you that angry." 

"You used me." 

"I asked you for a favor." 

"You _lied_." 

"Well _yeah_, Nathan. I'm kind of a dick, remember?" 

Another pause. Another piece of the conversation just for them. 

"You should have told me," Nathan said. 

"Yeah, alright." Duke sounded exhausted. "Sorry." 

Another pause, then a cough, harsh and wet, that went on long enough Audrey almost sat up to make sure they were okay. When it stopped, rustling. Someone stood. 

"You should lie down," Nathan said. "You caught a lot of smoke out there." 

"So did you." Duke coughed again, gentler this time. 

"Can't feel it," Nathan said. Audrey hoped that pause was Duke giving him a dirty look. "Looks like Audrey's claimed the couch. You can have the guestroom." 

"Should wake her up," Duke said, softer and closer. "Let her take the bed." She picturing him standing above her, like he had when he pulled her from the fire, silver eyes narrowed in concern. He'd done that in the hospital too, hovered by her side until the doctors shoved an oxygen mask at him and threatened sedation. It seemed she was his as much as he was hers. 

"Let her sleep, Duke." 

Footsteps, moving away. 

Audrey slept. 

She wasn't sure how long it had been when she woke again, but the house was dark and quiet. She lay there awhile, feeling the aches in her limbs, the tight stretch of first degree burns on her cheeks, chin, and nose. The firm pressure of her bladder, which said in no uncertain terms that she was _not_ going back to sleep yet. 

She hadn't been in Nathan's house before. It was small, even cozy. Suited to someone who lived a quiet life alone. She found the bathroom without waking anyone up, she didn't think, and was just sitting down again on the couch when she heard water running in the kitchen. 

Duke and Nathan had similar enough silhouettes from behind that in the dark, with their head hung low between shaking shoulders, she couldn't tell which one of them it was. She was about to call out when she heard it, a hitching, rasping breath just short of a sob. Neither of them would thank her for interrupting such a moment. She went silently back to the couch, laying awake until the water shut off, and whoever it was went back to their room. Then she lay awake some more, until her own tears came, rushing up her throat and choking her. She curled into a ball and shook and shook and shook. 

And slept. 

The next time she woke was the last. Nathan held her by both shoulders, tears streaming down his face, his eyes endlessly, terribly blue against the red of burned and swollen skin. Sunlight crept in through the windows with the slant of early morning. She could hear birds calling, and the rattle of his breath. 

"Nathan?" 

He handed her a scrap of paper, crumpled, torn, and damp. She sat up slowly as she unfolded it and deciphered the hurried scrawl.

_Don't look for me._  
_\-- Duke_

She looked up at Nathan, words caught in her throat. Nathan stared back, swallowing convulsively.

"Parker," he said, voice wobbling. "Audrey. I can _feel_.' 

He folded into her, face pressed wetly to her shoulder, his whole body trembling. Audrey wrapped her arm around him as she reread Duke's note. 

"Well," she said finally. "Fuck _that_."

*

Garland had held on just long enough to see Max Hansen taken care of. His hand shook so hard as he signed off on the report stating Hansen had died in an accident that Audrey worried the signature would be rejected as fraud. All of Nathan's composure had vanished along with his trouble, and Audrey had to all but hold him up as he confronted his father, as he begged him to hang on just a little bit longer.

"Can't do it, Nathan," Garland said, arms wrapped tight around his chest. The whole building shook. Garland's desk cracked in half. "It's up to you now. You and her and — and Crocker. I get it now. Lucy tried to tell me, but I wouldn't listen."

Audrey wanted to ask what Lucy had said. How well she and Garland had known each other. How Garland could possibly have kept that from her all these months. But this was Nathan's time, and she wouldn't take it from him. Not for the world. 

"Don't you hold this against him, son," Garland said. "None of this is Duke's fault. He never wanted — I was the one who —" He shuddered, cracks expanding through the wall behind him. The fire alarm went off, and outside the door Audrey could hear the bull pen evacuating. "Isolation doesn't work. You got me? You gotta — you — you got —"

"_Dad_." Nathan broke away from Audrey and stumbled forward. The light fixture fell from the ceiling, driving him back again. Audrey wondered how much longer the station could take this. Which would break first, it or Garland. "Dad, _please._" 

Garland gave him a shaky smile. The cracks in the wall retreated, tracing their way over his body instead. "I love you, son." 

Audrey grabbed Nathan and pulled him against her. He stumbled, still overwhelmed by the sensations of the world, and let her pull him down, just as his father exploded. 

She was really tired of explosions. 

Vince and Dave packed Garland's remains into a file box while Dwight stood guard and Audrey hung onto Nathan in their office next door. It was too many blows all in a row; she could feel him trying to shut down under her hands. He didn't speak when the Teagues ducked in to offer their condolences. Didn't look up when Dwight offered suggestions on how to cover up the fire alarm, the building damage. The vanishing Chief. Nathan sat and shuddered, staring at the tile floor, until Audrey wondered if he hadn't picked up Garland's trouble after all, if they might be passed on through love instead of blood. 

The fire department came and ordered them out. The building was unsafe, cracks throughout the support structure. Nathan got to his feet like an old man. Audrey led him out at a shuffle. 

The sun was shining, which seemed rude. 

"Let's get you home," she said. 

"No." Nathan jerked his arm from her grip. Audrey's heart cracked open. 

"Nathan." 

"The harbor," he said. "We need a boat. I need to find Duke." 

Audrey dreaded what he might do when they did. "You're in no condition to drive your truck, much less a boat." 

"We'll get Gus." 

"No need." Dwight came up behind them, the file box containing the Chief in his arms. "I can take you." Nathan stared at him, uncomprehending. Dwight smiled sadly. "Duke's a friend." 

"You cleaned up," Nathan said. "After he —" 

"Well yeah." Dwight shrugged. "That's what friends do."

*

In the end, finding Duke was easy. He'd talked to Bill to make arrangements for the Second Chance. He'd talked to Jack, who apologized to Audrey and Nathan repeatedly when they went to see him, claiming he had no knowledge of just how far from grace his uncle had fallen. He'd loaded up with supplies to fix his ship and hired Gus to take him back to his island.

It was such a clear trail, it had to be deliberate. Duke wasn't running — or if he was, he was giving them time to catch up. He'd written the note in a down moment, maybe, a time of crisis, but he'd bounced back. He always bounced back. 

She looked at Nathan in the wheelhouse of the little boat, standing next to Dwight, balanced as easily against the pitch and sway of the water as the larger man was. He was sadder than he'd been; his losses were still weighing on him. But he was more solid, too. 

Her boys were troubled, but they were resilient. Audrey watched the horizon as Duke's island grew larger and wondered if he'd meet them on the docks. Wondered what his boat was like, what sort of adventures he could take them on, once he knew for sure he didn't have to hide anymore. 

She didn't know Lucy well — or at all, really. But Audrey was sure that she would have been proud.


	11. Epilogue

Garland stared down at Jonas Lester's body without really seeing it. His mind was a million miles from this case, from the beach or the bluffs that overlooked them. He'd gotten a phone call that morning, a voice from the past. 

"Chief Wuornos," it had said. "She's on her way." 

He wondered what she'd look like this time. What color her hair would be, what accent in her voice. He wondered how he could possibly look at that face and not burst, right then and there. 

He'd called Vince — to warn him, to ask his advice — and hand only managed "She's coming" before hanging up. 

Lucy Ripley had been the best person Garland had ever known. She'd been fierce and compassionate, playful as waves and resolute as rocks. She'd been his best friend, his confidant. Never his love, that honor remained with Nathan's mother, rest her soul, but his partner nonetheless. 

He heard the crunch of gravel, Nathan's voice full of laconic amusement, more cheerful than it had been since — hell, maybe ever. And the voice that answered back — 

Garland was wrong. His heart didn't burst or melt. It _warmed_, soaking into his lungs and ribs. Soothing his aches and patching his cracks. He smiled, just once, a little thing, then hitched himself up by his belt loops and turned. 

She was blonde this time. 

She was beautiful. 

"Well, keep looking all you want," he said, before he even knew for sure what would come out of his mouth. "This man's pretty dead, tends not to change much."

He caught that little look from Nathan and ignored it with long practice. "Chief Wuornos," the boy said. "This is —"

She cut him off, rough-hewn and blustery. "Special Agent Audrey Parker."

_Audrey._ Well. Alright then. 

Garland found his role easy as can be, startled by how natural it felt to lie to this "Audrey Parker". To nudge her and Nathan both in the direction they needed. He'd let his boy take up the reins, just as soon as Audrey pulled his head out of his ass. And when the time came, he'd turn Duke Crocker over to the both of them as well. 

He'd done his absolute best here, though he knew that wasn't worth much. He just hoped it'd be enough to see them through, and Nathan and Duke and Special Agent Audrey Parker could finally pull it all together in the end.


	12. Deleted scenes: Sprinting Away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A chunk of the climax of an earlier draft, because I love it and don't think I'll find use for it in anything else

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In an early version of this fic, instead of the island, Garland offered Duke a choice: he could go to prison for assaulting an officer of the law (Nathan), or voluntarily commit himself to the Freddy mental hospital, where they could monitor him and keep his trouble under control. This premise never entirely sat well with me, hence the scraping and rebooting of the whole idea, but it did turn out some interesting stuff, including what I'm posting here. 
> 
> For context: Garland still asks Duke to kill Max Hansen when he comes to town, and Duke still refuses. In this version, the scene takes place in the Freddy, and it sets off the crisis that results in Garland's explosion and death. The Freddy is declared uninhabitable, and Audrey and Nathan take Duke into protective custody, since he doesn't have anywhere else to go. Duke is kidnapped from Nathan's home in the dead of night by a Guard contingent led by Max Hansen, and much as in the final draft, Audrey and Nathan split up, Nathan continuing the search for Duke while Audrey handles the Garrick family trouble. 
> 
> And so: the scenes

They ambushed Audrey on the beach, as she wandered dazed away from the Garrick house, taking her down with what felt like a taser to her back. They had her cuffed and gagged before she could recover, throwing her into the trunk of a car without saying a word. 

She had the presence of mind to wonder if this was how they'd taken Duke, too. If Nathan had been treated the same way, when he went to meet with Dwight. The struggle in the study could have been staged. Max could have fed them a line about his black eye, just to get a rise out of them. They'd made a hell of a lot of assumptions on this one, really. Taken so much on faith. In her defence, Audrey had gotten really used to her odd little hunches in Haven _panning out_. She was a good agent in Boston. In Haven, she was a _phenomenal_ detective. 

Or she wasn't. Or she was just recognizing patterns she didn't consciously remember seeing before. Lucy had met and helped Garrick, Garland, even the chameleon out on Carpenters' Knot. Had she known Max? Or Duke? How long had she been in Haven helping the troubled? And why, _why_ wouldn't anyone in this town give her a straight fucking answer?!

She had a good long time to think these things over and stew. Wherever they were taking her, they seemed to be driving for hours. 

By the time they stopped, Audrey was wide awake and pissed, every muscle in her body cramping. She wanted to leap out of the trunk kicking, even with her hands cuffed behind her, but instead had to settle for stumbling along at the point of her own gun. 

Right. Well. She could bide her time. These dicks were _toast_ when she could feel her feet again, though. 

The house they marched her into was quaint, remote, and quiet. "Too quiet" was a cliche and an invitation to disaster, but apt in this case; she couldn't even hear her captors' footsteps on what looked like it should be creaky hardwood floors. All she could hear, in fact, was her own shuffling feet and her breathing, echoing faintly off the plaster walls. 

Some sort of stealth trouble. This must've been what they'd used at Nathan's when they took Duke. 

She was assuming, anyway. 

They shoved her into a room at the back of the house — and actual _shove_, a strong hand between her shoulder blades that sent her stumbling and overbalancing when she tried to catch herself. She went down on one shoulder with a heavy _thump_, sending sparks of pain through her that settled into a bruised ache. The already dark room went even darker, and she twisted her head to look over her shoulder in time to see the door shut. She waited for a click of a lock in vain, but didn't doubt the door was locked or blocked, anyway. She held still for several seconds, straining her ears instinctually, though her breathing remained the loudest thing around. When she was sure they weren't coming back in, she rolled onto her stomach and eased carefully up to her knees. 

They'd locked her up with her own handcuffs. A mistake, now that she had the room to bend backwards and dig out the spare key she kept in her shoe. This wasn't her first rodeo. 

"So. That's hot." 

The voice sounded almost impossibly loud in the darkness, making Audrey flinch. She squinted in its direction. Her eyes were starting to adjust to the low light, and she could just make out a figure in the corner, wearing white. 

"Mmph," she said, rolling her eyes and focussing back on her task at hand. Whatever trouble her captors had been using seemed to have faded; she could hear more than just her own breaths now. The usual buzz and hum of a modern, heated home, the call of gulls somewhere outside. The trouble must have operated under a limited time frame, or maybe based on proximity. That was good to know. If things went quiet again, it'd be a warning that her captors were coming back. She got the key out and set to work unlocking the cuffs by feel. 

"Seriously," Duke continued, his tone light and humorous. "You could sell tickets. Come see the escape artistry of the Amazing Audrey Parker." 

Audrey finished with the cuffs and tucked them away, reaching up with her other hand to peel the tape from her mouth and swallowing the pained grunt that tried to escape. "You couldn't offer me a hand?" 

Duke chuckled, faint and dry. "I'd love to, but I'm afraid I don't have quite your skills." 

Audrey moved closer. That damn white jumpsuit stood out nicely in the faint light from under the door, but she couldn't make out much else until she was practically on top of him. 

She could see what he meant. 

Duke's hands were rather excessively taped together, wrapped like a boxer's from below the wrists to up over his knuckles, his thumbs lost somewhere beneath wrapped layers. He held them up by his chest, forced into a prayer position, and gave her a little bow. "Namaste." 

"They really don't want you getting loose, do they," Audrey said. She took his hands in hers and tried to feel around for the tape's end. 

"What can I say?" Duke said. "It's the one thing everyone in this town can agree on." 

"Not everyone." 

"Audrey Parker," Duke said, and she caught a flash of a toothy smile. "You actually like me." 

Audrey grinned back, the grin that sent all but the stupidest creeps at the bar fleeing for their lives. "Or I've decided I just _really_ don't like anyone else." 

"Been there," Duke said. "Haven turned on you, huh? They blame you for the Chief? Or are they pissed you were helping me?" 

"They're keeping —" Audrey grunted, feeling her nail bend the wrong way as she tore at the tape "— _secrets_." She gave up with a huff and stood to investigate the rest of the room instead. 

"Well hell." Duke sounded nonplussed. "They've always done that." 

Audrey shot him a look over her shoulder. It was still too dark to make out much detail, and she didn't think her eyes would adjust any further, but she could make out shapes and movement, and had to assume he could, too. "Secrets about _me_." 

Duke shrugged. "Been there, too. I'd offer to trade, but uh." He held up his hands. "I already showed you mine." 

Audrey felt her anger drop from a boil to a simmer. He had a point there. At least her secret probably didn't involve murdering people. 

She really _really_ hoped it didn't involve murdering people. 

"Have I told you about Lucy?" she asked. 

She heard him shift and glanced back again. The room was small — a spare bedroom, likely, or an office — but she was already too far away to read his expression. 

"Nah," he said. "Don't think so." 

Audrey returned to her search, though she was increasingly certain the room had been stripped bare. "You recognize the name, though." 

Another shift. He was uncomfortable, though if it was the question or the situation, she couldn't be sure. 

He might just be tired of sitting on the floor. 

"Sure I do," he said easily enough. Like it was no big deal. "I'm assuming you mean the lady who was here last time, helping with the troubles?" 

Audrey turned to look at him again. He was leaning forward now, bound hands resting in his lap. "Did you know her?" 

"I was eight," Duke pointed out. "I didn't really know any grown ups. But — yeah. I met her a couple times." He tilted his head. "You . . . actually kind of look like her, I guess." 

Audrey shook her head. "Duke, I look _exactly_ like her. Everything but the hair." 

"Okay." Duke didn't sound entirely credulous but, as he'd said, he'd been eight. She couldn't have told him what most of the adults in her life at that age looked like, either. 

Audrey finished her circuit of the room in — well, not _silence_, but without further talking anyway — then sat down next to Duke and started working on his taped hands again. He'd been working on them too, she could see: the tape around his wrists was stretched and twisted, making it harder for her to get a good grip. "Could you tell me about her?" she asked. "I know you were a kid, but I'm pretty sure you're the only person who's been honest with me about her so far who hasn't immediately run away or died." 

"Damn," Duke said. "That's not a great record." 

Audrey laughed. "Not so much, no." 

She felt more than saw him nod. "Yeah, alright. I guess Nathan's probably told you I was a pretty shitty kid, right?" 

"No. He's called you a bunch of names, though." 

Duke chuckled. "Well, I was. Used to beat up on people a lot, especially him. For no real reason except that it felt good. Making some kids bleed." 

Audrey sucked in a breath. "Your trouble." 

"Yeah. Pretty sure." 

"When you were _eight?_" Audrey grimaced. Kids that age were already little psychopaths. Adding the Crocker trouble on top of that. . . .

"Yep. Nathan's lucky the tacks in his back were the worst of it, honestly." 

"Jesus," Audrey breathed. "_Tacks?_" 

"Not my finest moment. Definitely would have escalated, except Lucy showed up. She talked to me like — like I was a person, you know? Not a screw-up, or an idiot, or a useful pet. She got me to lay off Nathan and the other kids, gave me a place to go after school when Dad wasn't around, even found me a babysitter." He leaned into her shoulder until she looked up, and offered her his tiny, real smile. "There are definitely worse people you could look like." 

Audrey ducked her head, refocusing on the tape so she wasn't looking him right in the eye anymore. She hadn't sat this close to anyone other than Nathan in she didn't know how long. Duke wasn't just a troubled person in crisis. She'd let herself care about him in more than just an abstract way. 

"Duke," she said, not quite sure how or why she was going to tell him this. He was still such an unknown quantity, but somehow she trusted him anyway. "I don't just look like Lucy. I think maybe I _am_ her." 

Duke went still. Even his breathing had gone quiet. Audrey waited, wondering how badly she'd misjudged him. He didn't make a sound. 

"Duke?" 

He twisted towards her, catching her hands with his fingers. His mouth dropped open, and she could feel the force of his breath on her face like he was shouting, but he still didn't make a sound. 

"Duke!" 

His eyes had gone wide. He stared at her, pulling his hands away, and tried to speak again. Audrey shook her head. He could hear her, she thought. She could hear herself just fine, but she couldn't hear anything else. Not the HVAC, not the gulls, nothing but the noises she herself made. 

She didn't have time to worry about that just now. She tensed, pushing up to her feet, and closed her eyes to avoid being blinded when the door opened. The moment the light hit her eyelids, she would move. 

Without light or sound, she had nothing but her own heartbeat to measure time by. It was fast, adrenaline pumping, so she figured around 100 beats had to be a full minute. She eased an eye open and glanced around. The door was still closed, the strip of light still unbroken beneath it. 

She could hear Duke breathing, the scrape of his feet against the floor as he used the wall as leverage to get to his feet. "That happen a lot?" she asked. 

"Once or twice," Duke said, eyeing her carefully. "Not counting when they dropped you off. I think he likes to pace." 

"Proximity, then." Audrey nodded. Maybe Duke was somehow closer to the troubled person? But that didn't explain the gulls outside going quiet. 

"That was my theory," Duke said. He backed up a step, still staring at her. "Until you started talking." His shoulders were straight and tense, his feet braced on the floor. He was preparing for a fight. 

"Duke." Audrey held her hands out, careful not to make any threatening moves. "I don't know why it didn't affect me. I'm not with them." 

"Right. Sure." All the charm had run out of his tone. "Because you're 'Lucy', right? Champion of the little guy." 

"I —" Audrey swallowed. "I _don't know_, Duke. I'm only just figuring all of this out, myself." 

Duke stepped back again, hitting the wall and moving sideways along it, always keeping her carefully in his line of sight. "The Chief warned me about this. All the different people who'd want to use me. Put the trouble killer on their leash." He let out a sharp laugh and shook his head. "Guess he managed to get there first, huh? So you had to get him out of the way. What'd you do, pick a face he'd like? Infiltrate the police so he'd never see you coming?" 

"_No._" Audrey felt sick. She could see the grain of truth in Duke's theory; there were definitely factions in Haven who'd want to use what he could do. The Rev, preaching that the troubles were God's wrath, the police, trying to hold everyone together and cover it all up. The Guard, who were still a wild card, a looming, creepy unknown. Any of them could have targeted him, and Garland absolutely _had_. Had even convinced Duke to use his trouble. Some part of Duke must have trusted him, not even despite being locked up and isolated, but because of it. She'd seen cases of Stockholm Syndrome before, she knew how captivity could mess with someone's head. As much as Duke had resented Garland and the Freddy, he'd also depended on it. To keep him safe. To keep other people safe _from him_. "Duke," Audrey said, slipping into the tone she used whenever she had to talk down a troubled person. "That's not why I'm here. I was taken, remember? The same as you. Maybe. . . ." She paused, pieces of the puzzle falling into place. "Maybe because of who I am. Because I'm — immune." 

Duke stopped moving away, though he still looked ready to bolt. "Bullshit," he said, more cautious than angry. "How?" 

Audrey dropped her hands and shrugged. "No idea. It's not just this one, though. I held a man together this morning, long enough to say goodbye to his family. And when I touch Nathan, he can feel it." 

"Your trouble," Duke said slowly, "is being immune to the troubles." 

"Maybe?" Audrey shook her head. "Except that doesn't explain Lucy. Why I look like her, right down to the soles of my feel." 

Duke pressed his bound hands to his face, shaking his head. Audrey risked a step towards him. 

"You can end a trouble," she said. "I can't be touched by them. Seems to me we're both targets for someone who wants to take control." 

Duke looked away. Audrey stood in front of him and silently offered her hands. 

"I actually want to trust you," Duke said slowly. "Which is _really weird_ for me." 

"It's pretty weird for me, too," Audrey admitted. "But we're friends. I've never really had a lot of those. And I'm guessing you haven't either. At least not in the last few years." 

"I'll have you know I'm a very likeable person." Duke hesitated, then put his bound hands in hers. "No matter what Nathan says." 

"He really doesn't talk about you that much," Audrey said, starting to work at the tape again. 

"Seriously?" Duke huffed. "Asshole." 

Audrey grimaced as she found a damp section of the tape. "Did you chew on this?" 

"Yes. And it tasted disgusting, by the way. I told you I don't have your skills." 

Audrey found a tear and started working at it. "I guess you really couldn't have kept a knife in your Freddy tennis shoes, huh." 

"Not so much. I used to have some really nice knives, too. I wonder what happened to them." 

"Your brother Wade got your boat," Audrey said. She grunted as she finally felt the tape begin to give way. She managed to free his wrists and the base of his palms with one good, firm yank, but the tape around his knuckles wouldn't budge. 

"Man," Duke said, hissing as he flexed and stretched his wrists. "That guy already had it all. Guess at least it wasn't Nathan. He'd probably have just sunk her." 

"What's with you and Nathan?" Audrey asked. "I can never decide if you two were rivals or ex-lovers." She expected a quick denial, maybe some gay panic. Duke just shook his head ruefully. 

"He's a great guy," he said, which didn't answer Audrey's question at all. "He's just really . . . _law abiding_. And holds a grudge." 

"Lawful good," Audrey said. She nearly had — there! She'd found the edge of the tape around Duke's right thumb, and started unwrapping it. Duke grinned at her. 

"Holy crap. Audrey Parker's a _ner_ —" 

His voice faded out before he could finish the word, along with all the other sounds in the room other than Audrey's breathing and the tape she was peeling off his hands. She looked to see him roll his eyes and bounce his shoulders in a silent huff, then looked to the door. 

A pair of shadows broke the line of light there. Audrey threw her arm up and closed her eyes just in time to avoid the burst of light that came when the door was slammed open. 

Duke jerked next to her and dropped to the ground. Audrey made out the shape of a blunt-nosed weapon in the hands of the man coming in the doorway. Her blood went cold. 

"Duke!" 

They wouldn't have brought him here and kept him locked up if they were just planning to kill him, would they? It couldn't be a gun. Audrey shook her head, refocusing on the weapon, even as two others came through the door and charged her. 

A taser. Likely the one they'd used on her earlier, recharged. They weren't tasing her again, so they likely only had one, and they considered Duke to be the greater threat. 

They'd regret that. 

Audrey moved, ducking out of reach of one man and throwing her knee into the crotch of another. He dropped soundlessly, and Audrey pivoted, just managing to block the punch the first one threw. She was small, and thus always underestimated, but she had training and more importantly a lifetime of holding her own against the worst kids and caretakers the US foster system could throw at her. She fought dirty, using every advantage she could get, and within a few moves had two men on the floor, writhing in pain. She sensed a third to her right, though whether it was his body heat or a breath of air or just some innate proximity alarm, she couldn't be sure. It definitely wasn't because she could see or hear much of anything. She jabbed at the man's center mass and brought up her knee again between his legs — 

And felt a hand clamp down around her throat. 

Light filled the room, a bare bulb on the ceiling controlled by a short chain. Max Hansen held the end of the chain in one hand, Audrey in the other. 

He hadn't felt a goddamn thing.

*

Audrey ended up in the trunk again. It was really starting to piss her off.

They'd rebound her in tape this time, wrists and ankles, a strip of it planted firmly across her mouth, muffling her groans and curses as the car bounced and jounced along what couldn't possibly be a proper paved road, even in Haven. There was nothing else in the trunk with her, nothing to keep her from being slammed into the metal sides or scraped along the cheap liner with every bump and dip. She couldn't even use the time (endless and undefined in the dark) to try to wrench her way out of her bonds; it was all she could do to brace herself against the trunk's interior to keep from being battered to death. 

Finally, _finally_, with a shriek of scraping branches and a final, incredible bump that flung Audrey into the trunk lid and left her dizzy and breathless, they stopped. She heard doors open and close, a brief tussle ending with a heavy thump, and then the trunk opened and Audrey blinked into the flare of late afternoon sunlight. 

She'd spent far too much of today locked in the dark. 

She held her breath as her vision cleared, and found herself staring up into Duke's face, his eyes hard and cold. For a moment she wondered if she'd been wrong all along, if Duke really was the crazed killer that Nathan believed him to be. If their time together had all been an act, up to and including Duke's apparent kidnapping. 

Then she noticed the tape on his mouth and the way that blank gaze was focused not on her, but on someone standing beyond her field of vision, past her head by the side of the trunk. 

"No?" Max Hansen asked, and then Duke was stumbling aside. Rough hands grabbed Audrey, dragging her painfully from the trunk and throwing her to the ground. 

They were in a clearing, small and overgrown, in some anonymous corner of the wilderness. Duke straightened to his full height on one side of Audrey, eyes still hard, bound hands clenched. Max stood on her other side, gun aimed at Duke's chest. 

"Tell you what," Max said, and switched his aim to Audrey. "Gut wounds are a long, painful way to die. How about I shoot her, and then you can just put her out of her misery." 

Duke's nostrils flared. He mumbled urgently into his gag, hands twisting as best they could against the fresh tape holding them together. He looked down at Audrey, meeting her gaze for a long, indecipherable moment before flicking back to Max. He closed his eyes and swallowed, unclenching and opening his fingers to Max. 

Max smiled and aimed at Duke again. "Good. I'd hate to accidentally kill her quick, before you had the chance." He kept his aim square on Duke's chest as he pulled out a hunting knife, long and wicked with serrations near the pommel. He flipped it so he held the blade, offering it hilt-first to Duke. "She'll have to go bloody, you know," he said. "You Crockers don't work right without the blood."

Duke winced, taking the knife awkwardly between his fingers and nearly dropping it. Max huffed and stepped closer, adjusting the angle until Duke's grip firmed, the blade aimed point down instead of out. Better for stabbing a prone victim, all but useless for escape. Duke was trembling now, panting through his nose, but his expression when he met Audrey's gaze again was resolute. Apologetic. 

Audrey braced herself. She wondered if once she died, she'd come back again as yet another woman, forever lied to, forever confused. Or if that was her trouble, and dying at Duke's hand would be it, for real, no second chances. She wasn't sure which was better. She held eye contact with Duke. He'd do it fast, at least. Thornton hadn't suffered. 

Duke swallowed again, staring back, then lunged. 

Across Audrey. 

At Max. 

The gun went off and Audrey flinched. Blood hit her face in hot little spikes. Her ears rang. 

Duke's eyes flashed a brilliant silver in the dying sunlight. 

She could see why that had been so terrifying for Vanessa. Wondered how Nathan could ever have written it off. Duke no longer looked human, his face twisted with rage, his eyes pale and sharp around stark pupils. He tore through the tape on his hands like wrapping paper and grabbed Max by the neck. The knife was gone, Audrey had no idea where. Max gurgled. Audrey saw the slash on his gun hand, bleeding freely. His shot must've gone wide, and now he was at the Crocker trouble's mercy. 

And so was she. 

She shouted into her gag, hoping to break through the blood rush and reach the man she knew inside. Duke didn't want this, he'd made that clear to her over and over. Even if it would cure Nathan, he did not want to kill Max. Killing Thornton had done something to him, broken him in one place and shored him up in another. Audrey just had to remind him. 

Duke made a small noise in return, of agony and effort. He flung Max away, across the clearing into a tree. Max's head cracked against the bark and he slumped heavy and motionless to the ground. 

Duke's hands shook as his eyes turned brown again. He ripped off his gag and sank to his knees, heaving into the long grass. 

Audrey gave him a moment, then started worming her way over the ground towards him. He looked up, let out a quiet, alarmed laugh, and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. Audrey glared. He smiled and reached over to pull off her gag. 

"Is he dead?" she demanded as soon as she could. 

Duke found the knife and set to work on the tape on her hands. "I don't know. Maybe." He glanced up at Max. Audrey took the knife to cut her own ankles free and Duke stood, moving warily to where Max lay. "No," he said, relieved. "He's still breathing." 

Audrey couldn't decide how she felt about that. She climbed gingerly to her feet and saw Duke pulling off Max's boots. "What are you doing?" 

Duke sighed. "You might not have noticed, Detective, but one of us wasn't kidnapped while wearing shoes." 

Audrey looked down at his feet, bare against the uneven ground, and spotted a bold streak of red down his right pant leg, too thick to have come from Max. Blood dripped down his ankle as she watched. Shit. "You're bleeding." 

Duke looked and let out a curse of his own. "I didn't even feel it." He gingerly touched the spot where the stain began. Audrey leaned in closer. It was a long graze, cutting across the meat of his calf. Max's shot hadn't gone as wide as she'd thought. Duke grimaced. "Feel it now, though. Fuck." 

Audrey scanned the ground for the gun, picked it up with her sleeve over her hand, and tucked it away. If they were lucky, they could use it as evidence. If not — she always felt better when she had access to a weapon. "Strip him," she told Duke. "We'll use your jumpsuit and some of this tape for a bandage." And it would be a lot easier to hide him in the oncoming night if he wasn't wearing white, no matter how dingy it had gotten. 

"Great," Duke said. "And then might I suggest we get the fuck out of here? As Max loved to brag, he's got friends. Who are probably as into his 'have Crocker kill Parker to end the troubles' plan as he is."

Audrey nodded and started gathering usable tape, all the while wondering what Max knew about her to make him think that plan would work. She searched the car while Duke changed, finding a roll of duct tape in the back seat. She made short work of bandaging Duke's leg, resulting in something quick and dirty, but hopefully tight enough to stop the bleeding until they could get him to a hospital. Then she turned to Max again, slapping a piece of tape over his mouth. She froze when she thought she saw his eyelids twitch, but he made no other move towards waking, so she turned her attention to binding his ankles and wrists. 

Just firmly as he'd bound hers. 

He was too heavy for her to move. She pondered, just for a moment, if maybe she should just leave him here, bound and gagged in the woods. She wasn't proud of it, but there was a part of her that revelled in vengeance, in a slow, messy death to anyone who'd wronged her. Getting eaten by a bear was the least this man deserved. 

"What do you want to do with him?" Duke asked, breaking her out of her thoughts. She licked her lips and straightened. 

"Send him back to jail," she said, more to herself than to him. Duke nodded slowly. It was the right answer, the moral one. It was also deeply dissatisfying. "Put him in the trunk. He can ride back to the station in there." 

There. That was better. 

Duke grabbed Max around the knees and pulled, managing to drag the unconscious man all of two feet before his injured leg buckled and he went down. Audrey lifted Max's shoulders to help, and between the two of them they got him a little closer to the car before they had to drop him again. Audrey bent over, gasping for breath, and saw the cut Duke had opened on Max's arm, still sluggishly bleeding. 

"This isn't going to work," she said. 

Duke followed her gaze, his eyes wary. 

"It's okay, Duke," Audrey said. "You can do it." 

"Audrey, I —" He shook his head, his eyes wide. 

"We don't have _time_, Duke. Max wasn't working alone, remember?" And Duke was bleeding and her head was throbbing and all she wanted was for both of them to be _home_, wherever that was. Safe. 

Duke swallowed. He gestured to Max's gun with his chin. "And if I —" He made a slashing motion across his neck and pointed down at Max. "You going to shoot me?" 

That wasn't a bad question. Audrey wondered which answer he wanted to hear. 

"You'll be fine, Duke," she said again. "Chief Wuornos was wrong about you. You don't need to be controlled. You do that just fine by yourself." 

Duke hesitated, pushing his hand into his hair. "Well. At least one of us thinks so." 

"Just use your new yoga routine." Audrey gave him an encouraging smile. "Impulse control, remember?" 

Duke looked away with a scoff. "I am an excellent yogi." He looked back down at Max and took a deep, focussed breath. "Here goes." He swiped his fingers through Max's blood. Audrey watched as the red vanished against his skin, fascinated and disturbed in equal measure. Once it was gone, Duke lifted Max easily, throwing him over his shoulder like a sack. He met Audrey's stare. "Nothing to it." 

Audrey looked back without flinching. There was nothing creepy this time, no monster lurking behind the silver. Duke was just a man. Who happened to have bright, shining eyes. 

He dropped Max into the trunk without ceremony and stepped back. His shoulders shook faintly as his eyes faded back to their customary brown. 

"Hey." His lips twitched a few times before he gave in and let himself grin. "Maybe you really are a trouble whisperer." 

Audrey gave his arm a squeeze as she moved past him, folding Max's legs towards his chest so she could shut the trunk. "Damn right I am. Now. Let's get the hell out of here, huh? I gotta pee."

* 

Audrey drove, Duke riding shotgun with his bandaged leg propped on the dash. In between attempts to try to guide her back out to the road (no easy task, considering the thickness of the foliage and Audrey's general lack of forestry skills), he filled her in on the sketchy details of Max's villainous monologue.

"A barn," Audrey said. 

"Yeah." Duke sucked on his teeth. "You summon it out of thin air. Apparently it's where you keep the troubles between jaunts into town." 

"Ohhhhh," Audrey said. "So it's a _magic_ barn." It irritated her that that wasn't as absurd a prospect as it should be. "And, what, you're thinking he maybe should have been your roommate up at the Freddy?" 

"Or he's trying to set up his insanity defense already," Duke said. He lost some of the hilarity and disbelief in his tone, going rueful instead. "I guess when you've got a police chief who can break things with his mind and a kidnapper who's a walking mute button, 'magic barn' gets a little less farfetched." 

"Not to mention the amnesiac who doesn't age," Audrey said, feeling cold. She drove them through a gap between thick bushes and found a pitted gravel track. "Which way?" 

"Left." She could see Duke eyeing her out of the corner of her eye. "You don't think he was right, do you?" 

"About the barn?" 

"About what happens if I kill you." 

Audrey shivered. "You planning to try?" 

"Believe it or not, Audrey, I have yet to actually plan to kill anyone." 

Audrey nodded slowly, using her focus on steering around the worst of the ruts in the road to buy herself time. "Honestly? It's not a bad theory. We don't know what's happening in Haven isn't somehow my trouble." 

Duke didn't answer for a long time. Audrey wondered what he'd say if she did ask him to kill her. That was what Thornton had done. More than once, apparently.

Difference was, Nathan had said no. 

"We could leave," Duke said suddenly. "You and me. The troubles are a Haven thing, right? So let's get the fuck out of Haven." 

Audrey smiled sadly. "You chose the Freddy over skipping town last time." 

"I was an idiot, last time." 

"I'm not going to run, Duke." Audrey chanced a glance away from the road and caught a moment of unguarded expression on Duke's face: fear and disappointment, yes, but also resolution, and the start of something that just might grow into hope. "I can help Haven; I'm not going to just leave that behind. And I don't think you're going to, either." 

Duke didn't answer, just sunk lower into his seat and closed his eyes. Audrey nudged him when they got to the highway so he could point her in the right direction, but otherwise let him sleep.

*

"Fuck."

An hour later, and they were stopped by the side of the highway, surrounded by dense, unbroken forest in every direction. Duke slouched against the side of the car, staring back the way they'd come. He had his arms wrapped around his chest, looking cold and lonely as Audrey walked back out of the woods from her pee break. 

"You'd think we'd've hit a gas station by now," she said. Duke shrugged. "Seriously, I know Maine has a lot of wilderness, but Max had to have a plan to get back _out_, didn't he?" 

"Might be in the other direction," Duke offered. "Not that that does us a lot of good now." 

Audrey looked back the way they'd come. "Gas light usually gives you, what, ten, fifteen mile warning? That's only . . . forty or so miles we'd have to walk." She looked up at the sky, cloudless and full of stars. "In the dark." She turned and stared in the direction they were heading. It looked exactly the same as where they'd come from. "You'd think we'd see another car out here or something at least." 

"We've already gone at least twice as far as Max drove us. We should have gotten back to town by now. Or at least passed a _house_." Duke straightened and stared towards the vanishing point of the road, expression hollow. "Owl Creek Bridge." 

Audrey looked around, expecting to see a road sign, or maybe a telltale guard rail. "Where?" 

Duke shook his head. "It's a story. A man gets captured and hung as a war criminal, and right before he dies he hallucinates that he gets free. Runs home to his wife. The moment before he can hug her — his neck snaps." 

Audrey's stomach dropped. "I think maybe you need to read less." 

"That's what this is, isn't," Duke continued as though she hadn't spoken. His voice was quiet, straddling some odd line between cheerful and bleak. "One last burst of effort in the brain. We didn't escape. We're still back there in that tiny, dark room." He pressed his hands to the back of his neck. "Or is this the Freddy? Lucassi's trying some new trick and I'm just. Stuck in my own head —" 

Audrey grabbed his wrist, yanking on his arm. She didn't have time for this. "Hey." When he didn't look at her she squeezed hard enough to feel his bones shift against each other. He hissed and yanked his hand away. At least she had his attention. "If anyone here gets to have an existential crisis, it's _me_." 

Duke blinked at her, the blankness of despair slowly shifting to incredulity, then settling back down into a sort of tired amusement. "Yeah," he said. "Okay. That's fair." 

Audrey nodded firmly. "Thank you." She took a deep breath and let it all out at once. "We just have to think our way through this." 

"If this was a trouble," Duke asked. "Wouldn't you be immune?" 

That was a fair point. "Maybe not, if the trouble's aimed at the road instead of at me." 

Duke frowned at the road in front of them. "A trouble that reshapes the world." He groaned, running his hand over his hair. "You ever wish you'd never set foot in Haven?" 

"Sometimes," Audrey admitted. "Not for long, though." 

"I promised my dad I'd come back," Duke said. "Last thing I remember saying to him. Turns out he wanted me to take over the family business. Of murder." 

"I'm apparently several other women," Audrey said. "And I live in a barn." 

Duke laughed. "Oh my god. Audrey Parker, you were actually _raised in a barn_." 

"Seems like." Audrey smiled, though it wasn't really very funny. "Hey. Max said I could summon the damn thing, right? Maybe I can get it to give us a lift into town." 

Duke raised an eyebrow at her. "I thought we were trying _not_ to be insane, here." 

"It's that or walk. Down what is probably a cursed, endless road." 

"Right." Duke propped his arms on the roof of the car and set his head down on them. "Magic barn it is, then." 

Not that Audrey had any idea how to summon a barn. She only had the most general understanding of what a barn actually was, magic or otherwise. She tried, though. She stood in the middle of the road as the moon rose, furrowing her brow and thinking _BARN_ as hard as she could. She tried visualization, picturing a barn straight out of a storybook, all red-washed walls and white trim, fading into view on the road. She tried to feel it, channelling all her need — for escape, for answers, for a goddamn sandwich — into a ball in her chest and pushing it out into the universe. When none of that worked, she stood straddling the line down the center of the road, looked up at the sky, and called to it like a pet. 

"Heeeeeere barn-barn-barn! C'mere barn!" 

All she got for that one was uproarious laughter from Duke, who lay stretched out on the hood of the car. 

"You wanna try?" she asked. 

Duke spread his hands. "I'm the trouble killer, remember? Not the trouble solver." 

Audrey let her arms drop to her sides and hopped up to sit next to him. "You are way too relaxed for a guy who was kidnapped. And then shot." 

Duke snorted and Audrey abruptly realized she was wrong. His pose was calm, but up close she could still see the tension around his eyes. It was the clothes, she thought. Max's clothing fit worse than the Freddy uniform, which wasn't easy to do. Max was broader than Duke, though, especially through the torso, and his button down and jeans hung off Duke like he was made of hangers. 

"Of the prisons I've been in," Duke said, "this one isn't bad." He folded his hands behind his head. "I've got space. Fresh air. A sky full of stars. Even good company. If we were on a boat, it'd basically be perfect." 

"What is it with you and boats?" Audrey asked. 

"What is it with you and barns?" Audrey scowled at him, and he chuckled. "I don't know. I've always liked them. Something about being on the water just feels like. Freedom." 

Audrey stretched out next to him, mimicking his posture. It wasn't even a little bit comfortable. She wondered how someone who looked so angular could bend to fit into such strange places. 

"Why did you choose the Freddy?" she asked. Duke sighed. 

"Haven't we been over this?" 

"We have," Audrey said. "It still doesn't make sense to me. Your trouble scares you, sure. I get that. But why didn't you run? You could have gone anywhere. Left Haven behind and never had to think about the troubles again. Hell, you could have escaped half a dozen times last night, but you never did. Don't tell me you don't know how to pick your way out of handcuffs." She sat up, crossing her legs and turning to face him. "You have every reason to leave. Why do you stay?"

Duke didn't look at her, just kept staring up at the sky. He'd given up the pretense of relaxation though. "Why do you care?" It could have been bitter. Audrey even thought he wanted it to be. Instead, it was confused, honestly baffled, like he really couldn't conceive of why someone else would want to understand. Would care enough to want to actually know him. 

"Because," Audrey said. There were a few reasons she could give him that would let him keep his mask intact: she was an FBI agent, or at least remembered being one, who specialized in hunting fugitives. She helped troubled people, and his was one of the weirdest, most dangerous troubles she'd encountered. He was a person and he was hurting, and she was a person who wanted to fix people. Reasons that held him at arm's length, that made this about _her_ instead of him. "Because I like you," she said instead. "And I want to understand." 

Duke finally looked at her, his eyebrows furrowed. "You like me," he said. Audrey nodded. One eyebrow rose higher than the other, and she knew he was about to make a joke. "Like, _like_-like me? Are you going to pass me a note in English?" 

Audrey held her ground. Duke groaned. 

"I don't know what you want to hear, Audrey. I'd been back in Haven for like a month. I'd just almost killed one of the few people in town I actually liked, and I didn't —" He pulled his knees up, propping his arms on them, and stared down the road. "There was a moment. After Nathan hit the water. I thought he was dead. That I'd killed him. And I was _happy_." He swallowed. "I guess it's part of the trouble. Same thing happened with Thornton. The blood and — and the killing — I can't even describe it, Audrey. I've known Nathan since we were five and when I thought he was dead, I wasn't even sad. I guess — a room at the Freddy seemed like the least of what I deserved." 

"Do you still think so?" Audrey asked. "When we get out of here, if the troubles don't end, will you go back?" 

Duke shook his head sharply. "No." He stared down at his hands. "I don't know if Wuornos really thought he was helping or not, but he sent me after Thornton. He pointed me at a blind man like I was a gun, and I let him. Then ran back to hide behind Lucassi and a mountain of sedatives for a week." He looked up at Audrey, his expression firm, though she thought she saw a telltale glimmer in his eyes in the moonlight. "I'm not going to let that happen again." 

Audrey put her hand on his arm, giving it a squeeze. "You didn't kill Max," she said. "Even when you could have. Even knowing that it could help your friend in the long run. You're not a weapon." 

He held her gaze a moment longer, then turned away, letting out a shaky breath. "Right. So about the barn." 

"If you have any ideas, I'm all ears." 

"Have you considered offering it a bribe?" 

Audrey slid off the truck, offering him a hand. "How about you show me how that'd work?" 

He grinned and jumped down, bouncing a moment on his uninjured leg before taking her hand and swinging it. "Of course. I'm a master of negotiation." 

They stood in the middle of the cursed road, heads thrown back, and shouted at the sky. They offered the barn money, friendship, and even sexual favors. When that didn't work, they tried threats, then begging. Duke was limping back and forth across the lanes taunting the barn, insulting its builder, its timbers, and its supposed livestock, when the road suddenly seemed to _flex_ beneath them and the trouble snapped with an audible pop. The endless highway suddenly bent into a curve, dense trees vanishing in favor of an ocean view, and the Bronco pulled into sight with a roar. Audrey bounced on her toes, unable to contain herself, and flashed Duke a bright grin. 

He rubbed his hand down his face and let out a noise that sounded like relief. "It's about time." 

Nathan leaned out the window as he pulled the Bronco up next to them. "Parker. You alright?" 

Audrey nodded. She'd never been so happy to see anyone in her entire life. As far as she could remember, anyway. 

Duke raised a hand. "I'm fine too, by the way. You know. Other than the bullet wound." 

Nathan looked him over with narrowed eyes. "You look like a homeless person." 

"Ah." Duke smiled. "But not like an escaped mental patient. So I'm moving up in the world." 

Nathan nodded. "Guess so. Nowhere to go but up."

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And then Fraudrey showed up and the fear trouble happened and Ian started working for Max and it all came down to a showdown on a winding mountain road. Or Nathan arrested Duke for murdering Max because it turned out his trouble went away while Duke and Audrey were driving out of the woods and Claire showed up because mental patients have rights. But none of the endings or directions went anywhere I liked and most of the early chapters didn't really go anywhere and mental-hospitals-as-horror-settings is an ablist trope that I wasn't turning on its head properly, so I scrapped the whole damn thing and started over. 
> 
> And the only thing I regret about that decision is that I couldn't get "HEEEEEEEEEEEEERE BARN-BARN-BARN" into the final version. ;D
> 
> Anyway. Thanks for reading!


End file.
